


Ghosts of the Gilded Age

by teaberryblue



Category: Marvel, Marvel (Comics)
Genre: 19th Century, Alternate Universe - Historical, Canon-Typical Violence, Fainting, Gilded Age, Hellfire Club, M/M, Multiple Universes, Pining, Possession, Pre-Relationship, Supernatural Elements, Victorian, ghost story, seances
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-28
Updated: 2017-12-28
Packaged: 2019-02-17 03:07:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13067832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teaberryblue/pseuds/teaberryblue
Summary: In 1883 New York, Tony Stark, millionaire inventor, is a man of science, reason, and a sense of humor that other people sometimes even appreciate. That's why he has no time for the latest popular obsession with seances, the supernatural, and the afterlife.Until a ghost finds him.





	Ghosts of the Gilded Age

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ladyshadowdrake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladyshadowdrake/gifts).



> This fic is rated T for some mild violence and language. Thank you to GJ for help with brainstorming and beta-reading. 
> 
> Happy holidays, LadyShadowDrake! 
> 
> This story is based on the prompt "2. Victorian paranormal AU - mediums are sought after guests at high society parties, and seances are popular in ladies' parlors. Tony Stark doesn't believe in ghosts, but he might not have a choice when one follows him home after an evening in a neighbor's parlor." combined with the prompt "1. Someone (temporarily or not) loses their voice." 
> 
> The one slight change from the original prompt is that the "evening in the neighbor's parlor" was changed to a different location. I had an idea for how to do it that involved a different place (you will see in the story) so I hope that's ok! 
> 
> These were such great prompts and I had a great time playing with them. I hope you enjoy the result!

WITNESS, the banner proclaimed in gilded letters, as it fluttered high above the crowd, THE MIRACLES OF THE MECHANICAL AGE. 

Tony cracked a grin, rubbing at his neatly-trimmed beard, and pointed up “What d’you think, Pep?” he asked his companion. “You wanna see some wonders of the modern world?” 

The fairgrounds were abuzz with people, with snatches of overheard conversation and the scents of food-- popcorn, gingersnaps, dill pickles fresh from the barrel-- wafting all around them. 

Pepper snorted and primly raised her skirts to step over a muddy patch in the road. “You wouldn’t see the woman who talks to ghosts, I’m not going to _indulge_ you by--” 

“ _Ghosts_ ,” Tony said, with a dismissive flick of his fingers. “Really, Pep. You want to waste an afternoon watching some old biddy flutter her eyelashes and shriek about spirits?”

Pepper laughed, and tossed her head. “I thought it would be right up your alley, Mister Theatrics,” she answered. “It’s all light and smoke and mechanical tricks; I thought you’d have _fun_ guessing their secrets. And anyway,” she said, waving at a poster as they passed it by. “This one isn’t an old biddy. This one’s young and _very_ attractive.” 

Tony paused to peruse the poster, of a young, gorgeous brunette whose curls were painted in a cloud around her face, streaming out into red wisps of smoke. “La Strega Rossa,” he read, dramatically. “The Scarlet Sorceress of Bohemia, here to cast her spell on the West. Very enchanting.” 

“Mmm,” said Pepper. “You know I only have your best interests at heart.” 

“Oh, thank the lord,” he said, relieved. “I thought you’d been given over to the fancy of the day, and next the house would be hung with crystals and we’d be _communing with spirits_.” 

Pepper wriggled the fingers of her free hand in the air, her delicate white glove dazzlingly bright in the sunlight. “OoooOOOOoooooh,” she intoned. “Mister Stark, a spirit callllllls to yoooou.” 

Tony snickered. “I’m shaking in my boots,” he informed her. “C’mon, Pep, if it’s all the same, why not drop in on a miracle?” 

“One miracle,” Pepper conceded, putting a single finger up in the air as if she might not have been clear enough. “And if it’s not miraculous enough, I’m making you take me to see the ghosts.” 

They had only just entered the tent when Tony heard an all-too-familiar voice. 

“Anthony!” someone shouted behind him. Tony groaned. “Is it?” he asked, rubbing his face, not wanting to look over his shoulder. 

Pepper sighed. “Justin Hammer.” 

“Can I pretend I didn’t hear him?” Tony asked hopefully. 

But there was a tug at his sleeve. “Anthony!” Hammer repeated. Tony gritted his teeth and turned around. 

“Well, if this isn’t a surprise,” he said, morosely. 

“Anthony, there’s someone here you’ve got to meet!” said the man who greeted him. Justin Hammer was wearing striped trousers with a lime green waistcoat, and Tony wasn’t sure whether the audacity of his clothing or the tone of his voice was more responsible for the dull ache that was slowly forming at the base of Tony’s skull. 

He was followed by a less ostentatious, slight, bespectacled man with red hair, who kept tugging at his waistcoat nervously. 

“May I present Doctor Phineas Horton,” Justin Hammer said, gesturing to the man behind him. “I’m buying his latest project.“

“Er, ah, I didn’t agree to that,” Doctor Horton said, anxiously, but Hammer didn’t seem to even notice.

“Doc,” said Hammer. “This is Anthony Stark, right here, second best man in the munitions business--”

“He left the munitions business,” Pepper interjected hastily. 

“Otherwise I’d be _best_ ,” Tony muttered. 

“Like I was saying, Doc,” said Hammer. “This gent, right here, left a big opening after he rolled up his business, made me a _mint_ when he left me without competition, but he wouldn’t sell me a damn thing. All those trade secrets, going to waste.You’re not going to make that mistake, are you, Doc? Anyway,” he continued, without leaving a pause for anyone to answer, “Stark, if you want to reconsider, my offer’s still on the table.” 

Hammer put a hand on Tony’s shoulder. Tony cringed. 

He hoped no one could see he was cringing. 

Pepper gave Tony a pointed look, and put a finger to her lips. She sighed, heavily, and waved a hand in front of her face, drooping dramatically, like a wilting daisy. “Gentlemen, this is _riveting_ conversation; absolutely riveting, but I’m afraid I’ve been on my feet all afternoon, and I’m just _aching_ to sit--” 

Hammer looked properly abashed. “Oh, heavens!” he said. “And I have to get Doc here to the stage door, don’t I? Well, don’t let me keep you, Miss Potts, Anthony...will I see you later, then? After the show, perhaps?”

Tony forced a smile. “Sure, sure,” he agreed. “After the show…” His eyes flicked around the tent, scoping out an exit at the far side. “Thrilling as ever; I’ll keep my, er...eye out for you…”

He muttered his thanks to Pepper as they found seats on a dusty wooden bench toward the front of the audience, quite close to the stage. 

She smiled slyly at him. “You owe me,” she informed him, just as a man took the stage and sat down at the upright piano on the apron. 

The man began to play a lively, tinkling tune, and the crowd hushed, a few clapping appreciatively. 

Then the pianist stood up, and turned toward the audience, the music still playing, even as he stood. From Tony’s seat, he could see the keys of the piano popping down and then up to the music, as if the instrument was being played by an invisible set of hands. 

There was a muddled chorus of ‘oohs’ and ‘aahs,’ and the man lifted a megaphone from atop the piano and sauntered to center stage as the piano continued to play on its own. 

“Ladies and gentlemen!” the man announced. The red velvet curtain began to draw back. “May I welcome you to the 1883 World’s Fair!” 

The crowd cheered politely. 

“Today,” the man went on, as the curtain revealed a table with a small box on it, connected to large metal bell on one end and a small black disk on the other. “We shall witness wonders of science that will leave you in awe!” 

He lowered the megaphone and stepped over to the table, the music still tinkling playfully from the piano. Now, he spoke into the black disk, but his voice came bellowing out of the metal bell on the other end, louder than it had from the megaphone, if a bit fuzzy. 

“The pioneers of science and industry have come from far and wide to share their wonders with you today!” he exclaimed. 

The crowd gasped in wonder. 

“Is this a miracle?” Pepper whispered to Tony. “Will you tell me when I’m seeing a miracle?” 

“So skeptical,” Tony murmured back. “You’re no fun.” 

“How is this any less theatrics and jumped-up tricks than the ghosts?” Pepper asked.

“Well, for one, the science behind _that_ ,” Tony said, nodding to the bell, “actually _works_. There’s a bit of carbon than helps transmit the sound through those coils-- I can demonstrate it for you at home, if you like.” 

“You have one of those?” Pepper asked, suddenly interested.

Tony shrugged. “Not yet. But give me a day or two.” 

Onstage, a pair of men wheeled out what appeared to be a box, covered in a cloth. The attentive audience was applauding, as the man they’d just men, Doctor Horton, walked out onto the stage, straightening his spectacles.

The stagehands left the box, still covered in its cloth. 

“Ladies and Gentlemen,” said Doctor Horton. “I am here today to introduce to you my latest and greatest work--” 

He tugged off the cloth to reveal the case, beneath, which was embellished with shimmering flames and decorative lettering. Horton stood centered in front of a glass door in the center of the case. 

“THe Human Torch!” finished Horton, as he stepped away, revealing the contents of the box, which could be seen clearly through the glass: a figure that looked for all intents and purposes like a man. 

Horton’s hands moved to the latch on the case. “I suppose you’re wondering why I say ‘Torch,’ but the _moment_ my fabulous mechanical creation is exposed to air, you will wonder no longer!” 

He flicked open the case, and no sooner had the door swung open, than the figure inside burst into flames. 

The reaction from the audience was varied and loud-- some gasped, some oohed, some rose to their feet with applause, and a few even screamed. 

Tony raised an eyebrow, suitably impressed, as the figure-- Human Torch, he supposed-- raised a flaming hand. 

Pepper whistled low.

“Is that miraculous enough for you?” Tony asked. 

“Well--” Pepper began.

“I’ll tell you what’s miraculous,” said a woman’s voice, from just behind Tony.

Tony started, and then turned. 

The woman who sat behind him was dressed head to toe in black, a dark veil covering her bright red curls and crimson-painted lips. She looked young to be a wife, let alone a widow, and something in the intensity of her gaze gave Tony a chill. 

“What’s that?” he asked, hesitant. 

“Yesterday,” said the woman. “Halfway between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. Train robbery. Witnesses say it was stopped by a flying metal man, who just...descended from the heavens. Like an _angel_.” 

“ _What_?” Pepper asked, hotly. Tony didn’t even need to look at her to know that she was almost certainly glaring daggers at him. 

“Interestingly enough, he turned the culprits in to the police along with a stash of contraband weapons that had been stolen from your own defunct plant, Mr. Stark.” 

Tony smiled at the stranger, gave her an easy shrug.“Fascinating,” he said, and he glanced at Pepper. “Pep, did you hear the lady? A flying metal man!” 

“Well,” Pepper said, with a perfunctory nod. “That certainly would be a miracle, if that existed.” She shot Tony what could only be described as an _incredibly_ dirty look, and kicked his foot, under the bench. 

Tony’s toes curled in, and he tried not to wince visibly. He suspected-- hoped, really-- that Pepper hadn’t _meant_ to kick him quite that hard. 

“I have it on good authority it does,” said the woman in black. As if from thin air, she produced a slender, black calling card, printed in silver that gleamed in the light, and held it out to Tony with a sly smile. “And there’s a man who’d very much like to discuss the matter with you, Mr. Stark.” 

Tony took the card and looked down at it. There was a tiny silver eagle embossed on one side, and on the other, it simply said:

Colonel Nicholas Fury  
Fraternal Order of the Shield

It had an address printed on it, of a building in downtown Manhattan.

“Fifth floor,” said the woman. “Be there at two o’clock.” 

“Two o’clock _today_?” Tony asked. 

But when he looked up, the woman was gone. 

He stood, turning in his seat to spot her, but just as he rose, the rest of the audience rose with him, applauding Phineas T. Horton and his flaming automaton. He couldn’t see past the crowd, though he thought he saw a blur of black at the far exit.

He started forward, making his apologies to the others seated in their row as he walked. 

Pepper hoisted her skirts and marched after him, tugging at his arm as they got close to the door. 

“What?” Tony asked, pushing his way outside. 

“You _didn’t_ ,” Pepper hissed, glaring sternly at him.

“Didn’t what?” 

And Pepper stopped, and squared her shoulders, crossing her arms over her chest. “Metal man? Flying? Train robbery?”

Tony blinked innocently. “Is there a question, or are you just listing phrases in an inquisitive tone?” 

“You. Took. The. Iron. Man. Out,” Pepper said with a huff. 

“What makes you think that?” Tony asked. “I mean, I _mean_ , I’m sure there’s countless of airborne metal men just buzzing around the Northeast United States, committing random acts of heroism on a daily basis…”

Pepper was only glowering harder, and Tony sighed. 

“When were you going to tell me?” Pepper asked.

“It was an _accident_ ,” Tony pleaded, squirming. 

Pepper’s eyes narrowed. “You flew to Pennsylvania...in a metal suit...by _accident_?”

“Well, er…” Tony rubbed his chin. “I was calibrating the... It...you heard the bit where I stopped a train robbery?” Tony asked hopefully. 

Pepper’s expression softened, and she offered him a tight, awkward sort of smile. “You did good,” she assured him. “Just...next time, maybe finish the calibration testing first? I don’t want you ending up like Mister Human Pyre in there.”

“Pretty sure that was an automaton, Pep,” Tony said. “I’m more worried about--” he waved the little calling card in front of her. He’d worried at it with his thumb so hard that there was a little dent in the corner, from where he’d buried his fingernail in the cardboard.

“So am I,” Pepper answered. “If you set yourself on fire, I can at least say I told you so...if these--” she gestured around, at the crowd, as if she could have been talking about any one of the-- “ _people_ find out about it…” 

She swallowed, and looked at the card, then snatched it from Tony’s hands. “Here,” she offered, and ripped it in half. “We should leave before they find you again.” 

She handed the card back to Tony, who tore it into even smaller pieces and tossed them on the ground. “Home, it is. I’ll even finish the calibration, if it makes you happy.” 

Pepper glanced around uneasily, one more time, and then smiled back at him. “It does,” she said. “But you still owe me a seance.”

~

Tony gently laid the suit back in its case. The outer shell was still warm from use, and he lay a hand flat across the breastplate, affectionately, before dragging himself, blearily, up the stairs from his cellar workshop.

The clock struck one.

“You’re late,” Pepper said. He couldn’t make out her face, but the flicker of a candle flame came into view at the top of the stairs. 

Tony sighed and rubbed a smudge of grease from his cheek. “You waited up,” he observed. “Pep, I don’t pay you enough to wait up.” 

Pepper gave him a hard look. “You went out again.” 

“I...may have had to do a small...practical examination…” Tony explained, fidgeting with his fingers. “No one saw me, this time. I promise.” 

Pepper watched him, a moment longer, and then sighed, and nodded. “I’m your secretary,” she said. “Not your mother. Just be careful.” 

They said their goodnights, and Tony shut the door behind him, and lit the gaslight, which illuminated in a pale burst of blue. The room was chilly, and he considered getting into bed fully dressed, but supposed Jarvis would have his hide if he got machine grease on the sheets. He slowly stripped off his filthy clothing and made at least a small effort to scrub the grease off his skin. He frowned in the mirror at the metal plate inserted into his chest as he carefully wiped the surface clean of grit, then tapped it to hear the soft sound of fingers against steel, the slight, hollow echo that let him know that fluid hadn’t build up around the life-saving apparatus within. 

The generator sat by his bed, encased in a sleek wooden frame that made it look like a night-table, all but for the long cord that protruded from one end, and the shiny brass crank in its back. He sat on the edge of the bed, attached the cord to the plate, and wound the crank, then sat back, closing his eyes and listening to the warm hum of the generator as it pumped current into the mechanism that kept his heart from stopping. 

When the crank wound out, he unplugged the cord, letting it retract into its case, and pulled the covers up over himself. 

In bed, he flicked off the light, but just as the room dissolved into darkness, he heard a tap. 

“Pep?” he asked, and he pushed back the covers, walking toward the door. “Pep, is that you?” 

There was another tap. 

“Who’s there?” Tony asked. “Jarvis? For God’s sake, is _everyone_ waiting up for me?”

He opened the door, completely prepared to be annoyed, but when he did, he found nothing but a dark, empty hall. 

He groaned. 

“Hearing things,” he muttered. “Of course I’m hearing things.” 

He shut the door, and turned toward bed, when he heard another tap. 

Tony flicked the light back on, and looked around the room, looked outside to see if something was hitting the window. 

Nothing. 

Tony sighed. “Suppose it could be mice,” he determined, and turned the light off again. 

But as he curled up in his bed and wrapped the blankets back around him, he could have sworn he heard another sound, and this time it seemed to be an indistinct whisper. 

He shivered, and then scolded himself. “You’ve _got_ to get some sleep,” he whispered aloud. “Pepper was right.” 

Pepper _was_ right. He was exhausted. So exhausted, he supposed, that his imagination was running away with itself. He listened, in the darkness, and only heard the soft murmurs of breeze and the chirps of insects outside. And if he thought he saw a strange, bluish glow beside his bed as he drifted off to sleep, it was likely only some creeping afterimage or a trick of the light.

~

“Tony?” said Pepper, softly. “Tony, wake up.”

“Hmm?” Tony mumbled, and he slowly became aware of his surroundings. He felt cool, and slightly clammy, and his face was pressed up against something solid and a bit gritty. 

He opened his eyes and found himself staring directly into the nose of a pair of pliers.

Tony snapped to attention. “What time is it?!” he asked, rubbing at his face. His jaw ached...his neck ached, his shoulders ached. _Everything_ ached, no doubt because he’d been curled up half-balanced against his workbench. 

“It’s six,” Pepper replied. “In the evening. You’ve got an hour if we’re going to be there before eight.” 

“Ah!” Tony said, and he hastily shot to his feet, only to immediately stumble over himself. He’d slept with his ankle twisted beneath him, and now, as he put weight on it, it turned to pins and needles. 

He gritted his teeth and steadied himself on his workbench. “I’ll be ready in a--” 

He frowned. “Where are we going?” he asked. 

“To the Hellfire Club,” Pepper answered. “You owe me a seance, and there’s one there, tonight.” 

“I--er.” Tony scratched at his head, and bits of sawdust and iron filings fell from his hair. “The Hellfire Club’s a private club,” he ventured. 

Pepper nodded. “That’s right,” she said. 

“That, er, ah...means you need to be a _member_ to attend,” Tony explained.

“You _are_ a member, Tony,” Pepper informed him. “Be ready by seven?” 

The air was cool and brisk that night as they alighted their coach not far from the illustrious Hellfire Club. The club was situated in a rather circumspect, if stately, looking townhouse, on a quiet, tree-lined street. He offered Pepper his arm, and the two walked toward the building.

But something tickled at the back of his neck, and he couldn’t chase the feeling that he was being watched. He glanced over his shoulder-- two, three, four times.

“Is something the matter?” Pepper asked. 

“I thought--” Tony glanced back again. There were few people out on the street-- a cluster of gentlemen, no doubt from the club, smoking cigars, a young man with a rather impatient expression pacing back and forth on the sidewalk, and a few horse-drawn carriages that came and went, but that was all. No one seemed attentive enough to be watching him.

“No,” he said. “It’s nothing. I’ve just been twitchy since yesterday.” 

_Someone_ had seen something, he reminded himself. But he’d been so cautious, and now it felt as if there were eyes _everywhere_. 

At the top of the front steps, just as he reached for the door to the club, he felt a tap at his shoulder. He turned with a start and a small gasp, and was immediately embarrassed by his reaction. 

He regained his composure, apologized for startling, and focused his eyesight.

But there was no one there. 

“Tony?” Pepper asked, frowning warily at him. 

But the hand on his shoulder had been so solid, so palpable. “Hello?” he said, and turned in a full circle. 

But it was just him and Pepper, and no one else. 

He rubbed at his eyes-- but of course, his vision wasn’t the sense playing tricks on him. He could still feel the sensation of a firm hand on his shoulder, could still feel the fingers gripping.

He rubbed his arm, shook off his unease, and reached for the door. 

“Mister Stark!” exclaimed a familiar voice as Tony walked into the foyer. The room was dimly, elegant, with wine-red wallpaper and mahogany trim, and the man who greeted him grinned, his sharp blue eyes glimmering in the lamplight. “It’s been an age! Are you here to see the show, or just in for a brandy, then?” 

Tony tipped his hat, then removed it, and tucked it in the crook of his elbow. “Evening, Mister Shaw,” he replied. “This is my lovely secretary, Miss Potts; she’ll be my guest for the evening.” 

Pepper reached in her handbag for their tickets, and frowned. “Tony? Tony, my date-book is missing.”

“Really?” Tony asked, and he peered over her shoulder to look inside the purse. She searched again, but it was a small bag and it should have been easy to see. 

“Are you sure you brought it?” asked Mister Shaw.

“I don’t go anywhere without it,” Pepper said, worriedly. “I-- I could have sworn.” 

“Do you want me to go outside?” Tony asked. “I can see if it dropped--”

“I’ll have my staff look,” Mister Shaw assured them. “We have eyes everywhere; if it’s in the Club, it will turn up. Do try not to worry too hard about it.. Try to enjoy yourselves.” He flashed Pepper a grin that was a little too toothy. “I hear it’s quite a show.” 

In the hallway, in a gilt-edged frame, hung the same poster they had seen yesterday at the fair: _La Strega Rossa_ , it proclaimed, and the same young woman with the same mesmerizing eyes stared down at them. 

“I’m entirely fine with leaving if you’d like,” Tony offered, a little too grandiosely. 

“No, no, he’s probably right; I must have left it on my desk,” Pepper said, as she slid her hands into the pockets of her coat, and immediately frowned. “Huh,” she said, and pulled out a slender book. “It’s--” 

She rifled through the book, and nodded, then held it up for Tony to see. “You see?” 

Tony made a show of sighing. “And there goes my excuse for skipping out. What did I do to deserve this?” Tony said, plaintively, thrusting his lower lip out as he made a show of sulking for Pepper. 

“You made me watch The Marvelous Immolating Man,” Pepper replied. “And got caught running around in a metal suit.” 

The lush main parlor of the Hellfire Club had been converted into a theater, of sorts: a large, circular table sat in the center of the room, surrounded by smaller tables where the usual crowd sat, smoking their cigars and drinking their brandy. The more central tables were occupied, and the chatter was high-pitched and eager as they surveyed the room.

“Here we are!” Tony exclaimed cheerily, heading for a table in a corner by the wall. 

“I don’t know,” said Pepper. “Can’t we _possibly_ find a table a little further away?” 

“There aren’t any tables any further away,” Tony explained cheerfully, as he pulled out a chair for her. “But I _very_ much sympathize.” 

Pepper made a face and ordered a glass of wine. 

A spotlight shone from the ceiling, and the crowd stirred. A flashy young man, dressed in bright green trousers and a grey coat, with a shock of white hair that looked as if it belonged to a much older man, appeared suddenly, in a blur, as if from nowhere, and there rose from the audience a polite gasp. 

“Ladies and gents,” said the young man. He had a slight, lilting accent that Tony couldn’t quite place-- as if it were from nowhere and everywhere at once. “I come to you today from our tour of the crown heads of Europe, to present to you my dear, sweet sister. She has been possessed of a most tremendous gift-- a gift to peer beyond the veil, to _rupture_ the very cloth that separates life and death, and to bring back the voices of the dead to speak with you! She has charmed and enchanted even the most entrenched of skeptics, and tonight, she is here to perform for you lucky few, her first time in America...La Strega Rossa!” 

The woman who appeared looked too young to have the reputation her brother purported, and Tony wondered whether they were indeed siblings at all-- she was dark where he was fair; she was small and compact while he was tall and lithe. She dressed entirely in red, with a headpiece like a crown dotted with ruby crystals that caught the candlelight of the club and refracted it, shimmering, around her face so that she gave off an otherworldly aura. 

She bowed her head, and remained quiet as she took a seat at the large center table. 

The young man, clearly the showman of the two, darted from table to table with practiced ease. “Tonight, my sister shall speak to the spirits-- and who knows what secrets she may reveal? Who in this house wishes to commune with the souls of the dead?”

A few hands shot up, eager, and a few more tentatively. Tony watched, and waggled an eyebrow at Pepper. “You should volunteer,” he said, cheerfully. 

The young man began selecting volunteers from the audience and seating them at the table with the Strega. 

“Me?” Pepper asked. She laughed, pressing a hand to her chest, and shook her head. “Oh, no, I’m just here for the show.” 

“I feel a presence,” said the young woman, in a hollow, haunting voice. “There is a woman in the room who recently lost someone very dear to her…” 

Her eyelids fluttered, and then shut, and she pointed at someone not too far off. 

Her brother stepped over in the direction she’d indicated, until he hovered just nearby a table. “Here?” he asked, and a woman at the table indicated herself, quizzically. 

“Yes,” said the Witch. “Bring her to me.” 

This went on a few moments more, the brother and sister selecting a mix of people from the crowd, some volunteers, and some others, to sit at the center table. 

“It just translates to ‘Red Witch,’ y’know,” said a gruff voice that gave Tony a start. He looked to his side, at the source, and discovered a tall, brawny man looming above them, dressed head to toe in dark clothing, a cigar dangling from a corner of his mouth and an eyepatch covering one eye.

Tony flashed the man a casual smile. “So we gathered,” he replied. 

The stranger didn’t move. Tony watched him, uneasily for a moment.

“Is this seat taken?” the stranger asked, tapping the back of an empty chair beside Tony’s.

“It’s, ah...no?” Tony replied. “May I help you?” 

The man slumped into the chair, crossing his arms over the table and hunching over in a conspiratorial sort of way. He grinned, the cigar staying expertly lodged in his mouth. “At ease, kid,” he said. 

The man reached into his pocket, pulling out a silver signet ring emblazoned with a medieval shield, featuring a large eagle, wings spread wide. “You know what this is?” he asked.

Fury held out the ring, and it twinkled in the light. 

“You’re Colonel Fury,” Pepper observed. “That’s the same as the stamp on your calling card. Fraternal order of the Shield.” 

Tony frowned. He glanced away for a moment, up at the table where the Red Witch was humming monotonously. The people at her table-- mostly women-- had joined hands and closed their eyes. Her face was bathed in an eerie light, and Tony couldn’t see the source of it. The show was clearly for spectators, he supposed, since none of the people at table could see it. 

Then again, maybe she counted on them to peek. 

“Eh, technically the Sisterhood,” Fury answered, nodding knowingly. “That was Mr. Stark’s mother’s ring.” 

He glanced at Tony, and held the ring out. “Yours, if you want it.”

Tony blinked, and then tried to fit the ring onto his finger. It was too small for his ring finger, but fit snugly on his pinky. “I suppose you’re here to initiate me into your mysterious order?” he asked. 

The Witch, on stage, was telling a woman about her beloved poodle, who was happy in the afterlife.

“Nah,” Fury replied. “Kids these days, there’s a new secret society popping up on every street corner; they’re like fucking daisies. But I knew your folks during the war; they were good people.”

He pulled out a battered frame holding a faded tintype photograph of a group of young men and women. There was someone who resembled the man in front of him now, the name “N. Fury” written beneath his feet in spidery ink. There, just beside a young man labeled “S. Rogers,” his face obliterated by a water stain, stood “M. Stark” and “H. Stark,” just as they looked in their wedding photos. 

“You see this?” Fury said. “The rest of these folks are dead. But the Order’s very much alive.” 

 

Fury withdrew the photo, and went on “I heard about what you did. With that metal suit. I’m trying to assemble a group...that wants to help folks, like we did in the old days, to put it plainly.” 

Tony tilted his head at Fury, and tried his hardest to look confused. The witch was soothing a crying widow by relating her late husband’s memory of a sun-filled day in a park.

Fury smiled at Tony, and blew a perfect ring of smoke into the air. “I figured you might like to do your folks proud.” 

Tony felt a chill, and he looked down at the ring. “Yeah, sorry,” he said. “I think you’ve got the wrong guy. I don’t know about any metal suits, and even if I did, it doesn’t sound that comfortable.” 

He swallowed. The room was strangely silent, and he looked up at the Witch, her hair streaming around her face, her eyes bright and wide and her skin pallid and grey. 

“I don’t need an answer right now,” said Fury. “You can think about it.” 

“I don’t need to think about it,” Tony said. “I--” 

But the Witch let out a shrill cry, and collapsed onto the surface of the table. She picked herself up, slowly, so slowly, like a reanimated corpse rising from the grave, and stared right at Tony. 

“Tony?” the young woman asked, and she looked wonderingly at him, with wide eyes and a hopeful smile, like she was looking into the face of a friend she hadn’t seen in a long time. “Oh, thank god I’ve found you.”

Tony pointed to his own chest, and then looked to either side. His back was against a wall; she couldn’t be looking at someone behind him. 

“What?” Tony asked. He grimaced at Fury. “Did you have a hand in this?”

Fury seemed just as surprised as Tony, and he was gaping at the young woman, his cigar removed from his mouth. He shook his head. “Don’t look at me, kid, I--” 

The Witch stood, and dropped the hands of the women who sat to either side of her. “Tony,” she repeated. “I’m so glad you’re here.” 

Tony jerked back so hard his chair squeaked across the floor. “Give it up,” he said, in a snappish tone that sounded less kind than he’d intended. “I’m not one for these parlor games.” 

“Why are you talking to him?!” one of the women whose hands she’d dropped snapped. “He didn’t volunteer!” 

“I want you to speak to my mother!” another one wailed. 

But the Witch stood, and, suddenly, and without warning, the large table flew up into the air, then crashed to the floor, the wood splintering and the velvet tablecloth flying, as the participants in the seance went scrambling for safety, shrieking with fear. The Witch looked down at the chaos, and for a moment, Tony could have sworn that she herself looked frightened at her own tricks. 

“Wanda!” the young man-- her brother-- yelled, and he lunged forward with what seemed like uncanny speed to reach for her shoulder. 

Tony was _fascinated_. He’d have to learn how they pulled this off. 

But her head flicked back up, suddenly and mechanically, and she singled him out again with her piercing gaze. Her eyes flickered, and for a moment he thought that it wasn’t just a trick of the light. 

Now the Witch’s expression was warm and eager, her eyes bright, and she walked to him, putting her hands on the sleeves of his jacket. The pressure of her small hands was firm and friendly— affectionate, even— as if touching him were an easy and ordinary thing. 

The audience around them murmured. She tilted her head and regarded him affectionately, reaching her hand up to stroke his hair. 

She leaned in, close, and whispered into his ear. “Hey, Shellhead,” she said. “I need your help.”

“What did you just call me?” Tony asked. “Look, Miss, I don’t know what you’re talking about-- you’ve got the wrong guy. And if someone’s paying you to send me a message, they’ve gotta be a little less--” He waggled his fingers at her. “Vague?” 

The Witch laughed, and grinned, and her expression was warm-- adoring, Tony almost thought, and she shook her head and reached for his cheek, stroking it with her thumb. The pressure was soft, and warm, and Tony sucked in a breath. 

“Dammit, Shellhead,” she murmured. “Come on, I need you to _focus_.” She stepped up on her tiptoes, and kissed him softly on the lips. 

Tony jerked back, stunned, and he looked helplessly to Pepper, who was watching with a rather stiff, nonplussed look. 

And she gasped, and she threw her head back violently, and her brother leapt for her again, catching her just as she collapsed, writhing. 

“Someone get help!” the young man cried, looking stricken. “What did you do to her?” he demanded of Tony, his glare fiery.

The Witch went limp, heavy in her brother’s arms.

“Nothing!” Tony raised his hands, defensively, in a gesture of surrender. “That was all her; I didn’t--” 

“You did _something_ ,” the young man snapped. “If you’ve hurt her, at all, I swear--” 

The people around them were standing, surrounding them so that they were all-- Tony, Fury, Pepper, Wanda and her brother-- cornered. They were looking from one to the other, murmuring, seemingly uncertain if they should applaud. 

“I don’t know what happened!” Tony insisted. 

The Witch’s brother shot Tony a disbelieving glare. “Help, dammit! Someone help me get her to her dressing room!” 

And the audience leapt into action, sweeping the brother and sister up and away from Tony, toward a sofa on the far end of the room. 

“I suppose that’s a _dramatic_ way to end a night of glamor and fraudulence,” Tony said to Pepper, scratching his head irritably, his lips still warm from the kiss. 

Pepper was watching the siblings, cautiously. “I’m not sure that was part of the show,” she said. 

“It’s all part of the show,” Tony replied. “It’s all tricks, light, motion, theater stuff. I’d just love to know how they do it at three-sixty degrees--” He squinted at the fallen table. “I don’t see their levers or wires, or anything. Good trick.” 

“You’re quite the skeptic, for a man who does the impossible,” Fury observed. 

“If I can do it,” Tony replied. “It’s not impossible. Nice talking with you, Colonel. Pepper, let’s get our coats.”

It didn’t make _sense_ , Tony thought, as they rode home, the large wheels of the coach thumping over the streets. The two charlatans at the Club had been talented, to be sure, and their act was believable enough, so why waste the interest-- and certainly the potential windfall of cash-- from the well-to-do marks eager to throw their money away on such a ruse? 

“It had to be Fury. Or someone else, trying to get something from me,” Tony said. “They _had _to have been paid off.”__

__Still puzzling it over,he said good night to Pepper in the foyer, and left his hat sitting on the front table. But when he reached in his pocket, there was the photo Fury had shown him, in the worn-out frame, with both of his parents smiling back._ _

__He felt a tiny twinge of guilt, and unease. With a sigh, he made his way to the study, and knelt down, perusing the lowest shelves for his mother’s old diaries. Working his way back, he finally found one from before he was born, and picked it up, thumbing through its delicate, brittle pages._ _

__He pushed himself up, turned around, and nearly dropped the book._ _

__There, in front of him, stood-- if “stood” were even the right word-- a ghostly figure, bluish-white and glimmering, completely translucent, so that Tony could see through the man and into the hall behind him._ _

__It was a young man, a little younger than Tony himself, tall and muscular, with bright eyes and a chiseled jaw, a bruise on one cheekbone, wearing a torn… _costume_ of some kind. The blue light dissolved into a blur that made the details difficult to discern, but the costume had a striped girdle, for want of a better word, and a star placed prominently on the chest. _ _

__The man’s eyes lit up, and he smiled. It was a broad, relieved smile, and it reminded Tony of _something_ that he couldn’t quite place. The man opened his mouth, and though it looked like he was speaking, nothing came out. _ _

__“I--” Tony stepped toward the image, which flickered and wavered, and reached an arm out. It passed directly through the other man’s belly. “Is this Henry Dirks’ Ghost trick? Some kind of magic lantern illusion? It’s very good, but--”_ _

__The man held his hands out, as if he were asking a question, and looked slightly irritated, then ran a hand through his hair._ _

__“I can’t hear you, pal,” Tony said, as he thrust his hand _through_ the other man. The light stayed more or less solid, and Tony’s hand glowed blue, casting a shadow on the floor behind the strange projection of a man. _ _

__The man stepped back, and opened his mouth again, but this time, it was a wide-mouthed expression Tony recognized for realization. The man smacked his own forehead with the heel of his palm, then his expression softened, his eyes turning down at the corners, and he reached a hand toward Tony._ _

__The hand, still seeming like a bluish projection, simply passed through Tony, as well._ _

__The man took his hand back, and finally raised it, a little sadly, waving._ _

__Tony blinked. “Uh. Hello?” he answered. He walked through the man , into the hallway, and peered around for some kind of lantern, or reflective surface, or _something_ that would give away the trick. _ _

__The strange man turned around, to watch him, now that he was in the hall, and mouthed something back, which Tony could only assume was also “hello.”_ _

__“I don’t know what this is,” Tony informed the man, “but it clearly--”_ _

__But the man reached two fingers to his lips, and kissed them, and then held them out toward Tony, putting his other hand over the star emblazoned over his heart._ _

__Tony hesitated, and he felt his cheeks grow hot, the hair on the back of his neck stand on end, and he tilted his head to one side, as recognition struck._ _

__That expression, that had seemed so familiar. It was the same one La Strega Rossa had worn when she’d singled him out. “The Witch--” he started._ _

__But this time, when the man’s image flickered, it guttered out like a candle, and Tony found himself alone again, the hairs on the back of his neck on end as a chill ran up his spine._ _

__Tony sat for a long time, and when he finally fell into bed, he couldn’t sleep, no matter how he tossed and turned. He saw the strange young man everywhere he looked, staring plaintively at him, even when he tugged the covers up over his head._ _

__He sighed and got up, and tiptoed down to his workshop._ _

____

~

Jarvis was staring, befuddled, at Tony’s desk, a silver tray in one hand, the next morning when Tony staggered in tiredly. He turned at Tony’s footsteps, looking startled, and placed the tray down on the desk.

“G-good morning, Sir,” said Jarvis. “If I may say so, Sir, you look like death warmed over.” 

Tony _felt_ like death warmed over. He collapsed in his chair, rubbing blearily at his eyes. “I was up late,” he said. “Calibration tests.” 

“May I suggest...going to sleep, Sir?” Jarvis offered, as he lifted the lid from the tray, revealing steaming-hot, freshly baked biscuits with juicy, ripe berries and a pitcher of cream. 

“That’s a brilliant idea, J.,” Tony replied. His stomach growled. “As soon as I eat this delicious breakfast.” He picked up a spoon and stabbed it right through the center of the biggest berry, then poured cream directly onto the spoonful. 

“Very good, Sir,” said Jarvis.

“Oh, J,” Tony said, thoughtfully, before Jarvis left the study. “I was wondering if you could look something up for me?” 

“Of course, Sir,” said Jarvis. “What would it be?”

“I mean, it’s not technically for _me_ ,” Tony added hastily. “Pepper was curious about seeing one of those seances that are so popular these days. With the ladies, you know. And I heard there’s a duo in from overseas...a Strega Rossa or something like that, Red Witch, or something, very popular. Can you find out if she’s got a show in the next few days?” 

“Certainly, Sir,” Jarvis said, raising an eyebrow.

“For _Pepper_ ,” Tony insisted again. 

Jarvis nodded knowingly. “Mmm,” he said, with an amused-looking smile, and left the room. 

He had just barely finished breakfast, and was licking at the little glass bowl the berries had been served in for the last drops of juice and smears of cream when he heard footsteps on the stairs. 

Sighing, he pushed the tray away and braced himself. 

“ _Tony_ ,” Pepper said sternly as she stalked into the room, skirts beling and whooshing around her feet, a newspaper pressed firmly between her hands. 

Tony raised an eyebrow. “Pepp-er?” 

“ _Tony_ ,” Pepper repeated. 

Tony tried smiling and leaning back in his chair. “Pepper.” 

Pepper cleared her throat and unfolded the newspaper, displaying the front page to him. “Tony. Explain this.” 

Tony tilted his head far to one side, squinting as he read the headline. 

“Gi...ant..giant metal...man,” he pronounced slowly, “res...cues...miners...in...deadly blast?” He blinked. “What a curious headline. I wonder where someone could have come up with a story like that. I--”

Pepper glowered at him. “You were out again last night,” she scolded. “It _made the morning papers_.” 

“There’s absolutely no way to tell that that was me!” Tony objected. “Perhaps it’s a different metal man. _Honestly_ , Pepper. _My_ metal man isn’t _giant_.” 

Pepper arched an eyebrow.

“To be perfectly fair, it’s not tiny, either,” Tony mused. “But it’s only the size of a perfectly average man; giant would be a completely inaccurate descriptor. _If_ ,” he added, hastily, “they were even talking about my metal man and not one of the no-doubt _other_ mysterious metal men rescuing helpless miners from explosions after the _perfidious_ work of certain owners whose names begin with an ‘H’ and end with an “ammer,” but who shall otherwise remain nameless to prevent mining regulations from--” 

“You seem to know an awful lot about this,” Pepper said, setting the paper down on the desk for Tony to read, “for someone whose metal man was nowhere near the scene of the daring rescue performed, _coincidentally_ by some _other_ metal man.” 

Tony grinned. “I knew you’d see reason,” he said, as he pored over the article. “Bound to be lots of metal men. Huh.” He stopped his finger over a name in the article. 

“Huh, what?” Pepper asked. 

“Nothing,” Tony replied. “Just...something here about how Hammer just signed a deal to supply guns to...this fellow, here. Whose railroad was robbed the other day. Fisk.” He pressed his finger to the name until the newsprint smudged. 

Pepper hissed between gritted teeth. “If you suspect something, Tony,” Pepper said, “don’t...don’t just try to fix it yourself.” 

“I won’t,” Tony assured her. “At least not until I have a nap.” 

Tony actually managed to fall asleep this time, though his sleep was troubled and punctuated by strange dreams. He saw the Witch, her hair streaming around her face and her eyes bright with terror; she was with him as they flew over the explosions from the mine and the bodies of the men who had burned to death before he’d gotten to the site. But when she leaned in to kiss him, this time, she became the strange young man with the solemn eyes and the star on his chest.

La Strega Rossa’s evening performance was at a proper theater, this time, if a small one, and Jarvis had procured seats in the front of the orchestra. “For Pepper,” Jarvis had said, knowingly, as Tony had set out for the evening alone. 

He felt a slight tremble as the lights went down in the house, remembering the night before, which seemed an _age_ ago, now, and for a moment, he looked over at the empty seat beside him and wished he _had_ brought Pepper, after all. 

The music began to play, and the curtain rose, and once again, the Witch’s brother stepped forward, and began the same pretty patter he’d recited the night before. Every time the Witch’s brother seemed to look in his direction, Tony shrank down in his seat, hoping he wouldn’t be seen or recognized, hoping it wouldn’t disrupt the show.

When the young man came to the Witch’s introduction, a small raincloud formed, and began to pulse with light, and a moment later, the Witch herself arrived with a jolt of lightning, center stage, as if from nowhere, and the audience applauded appreciatively. 

Tony even found _himself_ impressed. 

This time, the show went much more predictably, in Tony’s mind. There were the usual sorts of theatrics Tony expected from a seance, including flickering lights, and chill winds, and eerie, shapeless forms of light floating in the center of the table where the volunteers sat, rapt. 

The witch even rose into the air to great applause at one moment, but all of the volunteers were sent away with assurances that their loved ones were safe and happy in the afterlife, including and up to Gregor, who had turned out to be an extremely spoiled pet alligator. 

Tony wasn’t sure whether to feel troubled, or relieved. He slipped out of his seat while the rest of the audience was still applauding, and made his way to the stage door. 

The Witch’s brother recognized him as soon as their eyes met, and his eyes narrowed. “What are you doing here?” he asked, in an accusatory tone. 

“Came to see the show,” Tony answered. “Wanted to check in on your sister. We, uh--” he laughed nervously, and rubbed at the back of his head. “We weren’t properly introduced last night. Tony Stark.” He held out a hand.

“We weren’t introduced at _all_ ,” corrected the Witch’s brother, in a brittle tone. He did not shake Tony’s hand, and instead stared at it as if it might contain a venomous snake. “And my sister’s fine, no thanks to you--” 

Uneasy, Tony slipped his hands behind his back. “Please,” he said, shifting his weight from his left foot to his right and then back again. “There’s something I wanted to ask her. It’s important.” 

“She’s had a long day,” Pietro answered. “No visi--”

“Who’s that?” asked a young woman’s voice from somewhere behind Pietro. Tony perked up at the sound. 

“It’s your friend from last night!” Tony called. “The one who derailed your show and--” 

“I already told him you’re tired,” Pietro said, practically growling, over his shoulder. 

“Oh, no,” said the young woman. “Let him in. It’s all right.” 

“Wanda, wasn’t it?” Tony asked, as Pietro led them inside with an expression like boiling oil, and long, dragging footsteps--as if it he were putting in a great deal of effort to move so slowly. 

The dressing room was cozy and cheerfully lit, and Wanda looked much more like an ordinary young woman, here, changed into a simple red dress, her curly hair pushed back away from her face. 

She gestured for them to sit. “Wanda Maximoff,” she replied. “And you were--” she frowned. “I don’t think I heard your name.”

“Tony Stark,” Tony said, and he sat carefully on the edge of a velvet sofa. “You-- _said_ my name, last night.” Again, he felt a chill at the memory. 

“I don’t remember,” Wanda said, and she looked troubled at the thought. “I’m sorry.”

“You see?” Pietro said, brusquely. “We can’t help you.” 

Wanda sighed. “ _Pietro_ ,” she chided. 

“I--” Tony took a breath. “Maybe I can help you,” he offered. “Last night...you asked me for help.” 

“I did?” Wanda asked. 

“And then he _kissed you_ ,” Pietro snapped. 

Tony’s cheeks went hot. “She kissed me!” he objected. “I would _never_ \--” 

Pietro inserted himself between Tony and Wanda. “Neither would she! Are you _impugning_ my sister’s--” 

The vase of flowers on the table began to rattle, and Wanda balled her hands up into fists. “You didn’t tell me that!” she scolded her brother. 

Pietro turned to face her. “Wanda,” he said, sounding wary. “Sit down.” 

The vase of flowers tipped onto its side, water splashing onto the table, and Wanda huffed and sunk into a chair. 

“You didn’t tell me about the kissing part,” Wanda said, again, more quietly, rubbing her temples with her fingers. “What _else_ didn’t you tell me?” 

“So that wasn’t part of the show?” Tony asked. “And you didn’t--” He frowned. “You really didn’t know?” 

He wasn’t sure whether to trust her, but he couldn’t see any reason why she’d be lying _now_. 

“Of course not!” Pietro objected, still, at least in Tony’s mind, unreasonably harsh about the whole thing. “What do you take us for?” 

“Honestly?” Tony replied. “You’re faking all those other acts; I don’t know why you wouldn’t be faking this one. Unless you really want me to believe your sister can speak to the dead?” 

Wanda took a deep breath. “I can’t speak to the dead,” she replied. “I--”

“We don’t know him,” Pietro hissed. “Don’t--” 

Tony pursed his lips. “I don’t need to know your secrets,” he said, holding up both hands in what he hoped was a gesture of reconciliation. “I just want to know what happened.” 

“What happened…” Wanda echoed. She looked up at her brother, an inquisitive look on her face. “What ha--” 

She lurched forward in her chair, and her eyelashes fluttered, and she let out a cry. 

Pietro leapt to her side, so fast that it almost seemed preternatural to Tony, and knelt beside his sister, reaching for her shoulder. “Wanda,” he said, his voice rising to a frantic pitch. “Wanda, Wanda--” he glared up at Tony. “What have you _done_ to h--” 

Wanda’s body jolted, and she looked around, blinking, in a disoriented sort of way, as if she didn’t recognize her surroundings. “Tony!” she exclaimed, as her eyes fixed on Tony’s face. “I’ve found you!” 

She leapt out of her seat and stepped forward, her eyes bright, a relieved smile on her face. “I keep losing you,” she said. “Listen, it’s important…” 

She reached a hand out toward him, grasping for his hand. Tony let her take it, hesitantly, and she pressed his palm between his fingers with delicacy and real affection, that he saw mirrored in her eyes. 

Tony realized his mouth was agape, and he carefully shut it. “Who...are you?” he asked.  
Wanda’s brow furrowed, as if she couldn’t quite understand what he was asking. “Tony, it’s me,” she said, turning his hand over in her own and squeezing it. “It’s Steve.” 

“ _Steve_?” Pietro demanded. “Steve _who_?” 

“I…” Tony mentally fumbled for words, but Wanda-- or Steve, or _whoever_ this was-- turned to look at Pietro, and in that moment, dropped Tony’s hand. 

She blinked, and shuddered, and shook her head, swaying for a moment. She caught herself, grabbing for the back of a chair. “I have as little idea as you do,” she said. “I’m sorry, I--” 

Wanda glanced at Pietro. “I think I need to sit down.” 

She staggered slightly as she dropped into the chair she’d been leaning against. 

Both men blinked at her, silent for a moment.

She looked up at them. “I’m all right, I assure you; I’m only...suddenly a bit dizzy.” 

Tony exchanged a glance with Pietro, who poured a glass of water from a pitcher and knelt by his sister’s side to hand it to him. 

“Do you…” Pietro started, his brown knit with deep concern, “not remember any of that?” 

Wanda took a few sips of water, then held the glass between her knees, where it left a small dark ring on her skirt. “You _know_ I don’t,” she said, frustratedly. “We went over it this morning; I remember sitting at the table, with the volunteers, and then somehow I was on the far side of the room.” 

Pietro gritted his teeth. “I don’t mean _yesterday_ ,” he said. “I mean just _now_.” 

Wanda looked up at her brother, and shook her head, questioning. “Now?” She asked. “What-- oh.” Her lower lip dropped, and she sucked in a breath, then looked to Tony. “It happened again?” 

“You called yourself _Steve_ , this time,” Pietro said, and he gestured at Tony, with a suspicious look. “And you and this one looked _friendly_.” 

Tony shook his head. “I don’t know a Steve,” he answered. “Do you?” 

“N-no,” Wanda said, looking down at her glass of water. She bit her lip, and shivered. “I really-- I don’t remember.” 

Pietro put a hand on Wanda’s shoulder, and looked pointedly in Tony’s direction. “Maybe you’d better--” 

Tony pulled his gloves out of his pocket and began putting them on. “Understood,” he assured them. He nodded to Wanda. “Miss Maximoff,” he said, politely. “Thank you for your help.” 

“Oh, thank god,” Pepper said, when Tony walked in the door. “You didn’t take the Iron Man out again, did you?” 

Tony looked down at his evening attire, his long coat and his pristine gloves. “Dressed like this?” he asked. “I hope not. Do we know a Steve?” 

Pepper frowned. “There’s Stephen Strange,” she said, thoughtfully. 

“I mean someone who wouldn’t have an apoplexy if we called him ‘Steve,’” Tony clarified. 

“Oh.” Pepper scratched her head. “Then, no, I don’t think so,” she said. “Why?” 

“Because I think I saw a ghost,” Tony explained. “And I think his name is Steve.” He hung his coat, and put away his hat and gloves, and started for the stairs.

“A ghost named Steve?” Pepper asked. She stepped after him, crossing her arms over her chest. “Are you joking?” 

“No,” Tony answered. He kept walking, climbing the stairs before she could corner him. 

Pepper huffed. “Is that all you’re saying? Really?” 

“Yes,” Tony replied. “Good night!” 

He shut the door to his room, and locked it, and undressed for bed. Then, sitting in his pajamas at the foot of the bed, he looked out into the dim, quiet room, and wondered exactly how one _summoned_ a ghost. 

“Steve?” he tried. “Can you hear me?” 

He wondered if he needed to be focusing on something, or if he should do some sort of meditation. Chanting, maybe, he thought, or praying, although praying to summon a ghost sounded like it might be heretical. 

He didn’t have any strange occult-sorts-of-objects, no crystals, no spooky books. He supposed he could light some candles in a circle, or something, but that seemed excessive. He settled for one, which he lit carefully and placed in the middle of the floor, watching it flicker and glow from the bed. 

“Steve?” he tried again. “Ah. If you are, in fact, Steve?” 

Nothing. He waited a minute more, and then, sighing, and mentally chastising himself for trying something so _silly_ , he got back up, blew out the candle, and crawled into bed. 

But he couldn’t sleep. His mind was racing, as he played back the day’s events, and the events of the night before, and no matter what he tried-- counting, counting sheep, counting backward, counting backward sheep-- nothing worked. 

He groaned, and punched at his pillow, turning over in the bed. 

And there was the man, the same man as before, glowing blue and translucent, flickering inconsistently, and sitting on his bedroom floor and looking up at him with a solemn expression, as if he were keeping vigil. 

Tony was so startled he let out a yelp, and sat up straight in bed, tangling his fingers into the blankets, tightly. 

The man on the floor sat up straighter, then stood up, and stepped toward him. 

“Steve?” Tony tried. “Are you Steve?” 

The man’s expression brightened, his eyes crinkling at the corners, and he nodded, and mouthed… _something_.

“I’m sorry,” Tony said. “I can’t hear you. Steve,” he said, experimentally, and then he said it again. “Steve. You were talking to me through Wanda?” 

The man-- Steve, definitely Steve, Tony knew now, nodded, and he reached for Tony again, as if he were going to caress Tony’s cheek. Tony’s face went hot with anticipation, but again, Steve’s hand passed through him, as if it were nothing, a trick of the light, and Tony felt himself slump. 

Steve wore a dismayed expression, and he shook his head, and shrugged, holding his hands out as if he were trying to apologize. 

Tony bit his lip. “Last night,” he tried. “That was you, too? When Wanda…” He put his fingers to his mouth.

Steve nodded. Tony drew in a tight breath. 

“Right,” he said. He watched Steve watching him, and he’d never, never in his _life_ known someone to look at him the way this man was looking at him now. It sent a chill through his body, and he met Steve’s gaze with an equally intense one, all the while telling himself that this was ridiculous, that this was a ghost, that he’d never…

“Last night,” Tony ventured. “You asked me for help. I want to help.” 

Steve smiled, nodding gratefully, and clasped his hands together.

“What can I do?” Tony asked. “How can I--” 

Steve’s image wavered, and guttered out, like a candle.

“Help,” Tony said, to an empty room. The word echoed in the darkness, and he felt terribly alone.

~

“What did you do to yourself?” Pepper demanded over breakfast the next morning, looking very unapprovingly at the purple welt just above Tony’s brow.

“Fell out of bed,” Tony answered, and he tapped delicately at the tip of his hard-boiled egg with the edge of his spoon until the shell cracked. He popped it off, satisfyingly, in one piece, and picked up the salt shaker. 

“Did you happen to fall out of bed in New Jersey?” Pepper asked interestedly. 

“Of course not,” Tony replied. “My bed’s upstairs. In New York.” 

“Is it really?” said Pepper, between bites of toast. “Because curiously enough, three men smuggling weapons purportedly stolen from your friend Justin Hammer were dropped off at a jail in New Jersey very late last night, and one of them swears to God that they were apprehended by a flying metal man.” 

“Hmm.” Tony chewed thoughtfully at his egg. “That’s incredibly fascinating, Pepper, but I don’t see what it has to do with my bed, into which no one, flying or otherwise, dropped even one man last night. More’s the pity.” 

Pepper pushed her plate back away from her, and gave Tony a concerned look. “What’s gotten into you?” she asked. “You never used to be this rash--” 

“I was absolutely this rash!” Tony objected. “It was just over much more frivolous things. At least I’m being rash for a good cause.” He cleared his throat. “That does not in any way involve metal men.”  
Pepper shot him a very dirty look, and they finished breakfast without speaking. 

That afternoon, Tony ventured out to the theater where La Strega Rossa had performed the night before, but there was no sign of Wanda or Pietro, and the Witch’s poster had been replaced with one for Tiboldt’s Circus, boasting a trapeze act and the ‘World’s Greatest Marksman”. 

Swearing under his breath, Tony left and tried the Hellfire Club, but no one there knew how to contact the duo, either. 

Resignedly, he started for home. And, on an empty street, in Downtown Manhattan, when he was quite sure that there was no one around to watch him or hear him, he looked around, hopefully, and whispered, “Steve?” 

When he arrived back at his house, he poked through the books in his study to see if he could find something, anything about summoning ghosts, but the _only_ writings he could find were ones that scoffed at occultism.

Pepper stuck her nose into the study at one point, and peered curiously at the open books on his desk. “Still looking for your ghost?” she asked. 

“His name is Steve,” Tony corrected. 

“Oh, of course, naturally.” Pepper paged through the topmost book. “The belief in the supernatural is a symptom of only the most feeble-minded…” she began to read aloud, but then shut the book. “Well, obviously. What makes you think you saw a ghost, anyhow? Er, a Steve. I mean a Steve.” 

“Well,” Tony replied, thoughtfully, only vaguely away that he was being mocked. He opened to a chapter on the afterlife, only to find a lot of theological opinions, and frowned. “It was probably the part where there was a ghost, and I saw him.” 

He continued to pore through books after Pepper left, and when he’d determined there was nothing of interest, he went to bang on things in his workshop. Every now and then, when it was quiet, and he was alone, he’d say Steve’s name, and look around, waiting, and hoping, but nothing happened. 

And then, after dinner, when he went back to his study to pick up the books he’d laid littered around his desk that afternoon, Steve was waiting there. 

“You’re back!” Tony exclaimed, and Steve grinned, warmly and openly, and raised a hand to wave. 

“All right,” Tony said. “What can I do to help?” 

Steve opened his mouth, and started speaking, quickly and urgently, but of course, Tony couldn’t hear a thing, and when Steve noticed that Tony was simply standing there, watching, uncomprehending, his face fell, and he stopped talking. 

Steve rubbed at his chin, and then, his face brightened, and he lifted a finger, tracing a rectangle in the air. 

“Is that a square?” Tony asked. “No, ah. A box? A...window?” 

Steve gestured eagerly, waving with his free hand as if to tell Tony to keep going. He mimed a motion, moving his hand from one side of the rectangle to the other, as if he were opening it. 

“A book?” Tony asked. “No, no...a door?” 

Steve grinned, and put a finger in the air. 

“It’s a door,” Tony repeated. 

Steve nodded. He made the opening gesture again. 

“Open the door?” 

Excitedly, Steve opened his mouth and shouted something, though, again, no noise came out. But it was a single word, and Tony could guess what it was.

“Yes,” Tony echoed. He turned around and opened the door to the study, but Steve walked through him, and held his hands up, shrugging. 

“Not that door,” Tony observed. “Right. Open the door. The door between _us_?”

Steve, flickering, nodded again. He pointed to himself, and then to Tony, and then mimed opening a door once more. 

Tony, watching intently, smiled in spite of himself, and before he remembered what he was doing, he reached out for Steve’s hand. 

“Open the door between me and you?” he tried. His hand grasped at nothing but air, and a moment later, Steve had vanished entirely. 

“Great,” Tony muttered, and he rubbed at the bridge of his nose, collapsing into his chair. “Now all I have to do is figure out how to open a door to the afterlife.”

~

“Mr. Stark?” Jarvis tapped on the door to Tony’s study.

“Hm?” Tony called back. “I’m, ah. I’m busy.” 

“It’s only that there’s a...peculiar smell, and I thought I ought to check…is something _burning_?” 

The butler opened the door, and Tony hastily pushed himself up from the floor, holding the box of matches behind his back as if he were still a small child. 

“It’s…” Tony started, looking down at the small glass dish full of smoldering greens in the center of the circle carefully drawn in salt. “Ah. It’s...dandelions?” 

Jarvis frowned at the floor, then glanced at the books laid out on the desk, the uppermost of which featured a carefully-drawn pentagram. “Are you, ah...dabbling in witchcraft, Sir? Not that it’s any of my business, mind, but…” 

Tony scratched his chin. “I, er. I saw a beetle.” 

“A what, Sir?” 

“A beetle,” Tony explained. “The, ah…” He gestured at the salt and the dandelions. “The smell’s supposed to keep them out of the house.” 

“Ah,” said Jarvis. He didn’t look particularly convinced. “Well, do be sure to clean up this mess when you’re through. The salt’s going to be a bit troublesome in the crevices, you know.”

Tony sighed as the butler left, and tried to find his instructions so he could start the summoning spell over from the beginning. 

It had been three days. He couldn’t sleep-- or, if he did, he only dreamed of Steve, glowing blue, reaching for him but never being able to touch. He’d tried everything he could find in books-- he’d lit candles, drawn symbols, and he had even gone so far as to inquire after pig’s blood at the butcher before he decided that was one thing he couldn’t quite stomach. He was exhausted, clumsy, and felt as if he were on high alert-- always turning to look behind, always checking dark corners or strangers who appeared in the periphery of his vision. 

He’d even seen a young man on the street who looked curiously like this Steve-- tall, with sandy hair and the same straight jaw, and he’d nearly thought he’d _found_ him before the man in question had turned and Tony had seen his features, which, while not unattractive, weren’t _Steve’s_. 

He’d kept looking for Wanda, and even Pietro, but without luck. 

Now, he picked up the book with the instructions on how to summon the dead using dandelions, and began reading from where he left off. 

“Eat..” He squinted. “What? Am I supposed to burn these, or eat these, or burn and _then_ eat…” Groaning, he turned the page, checking to see if he’d gotten two spells confused. Not that it mattered, he told himself. None of them had _worked_. 

“All right,” he said, carefully checking the order of the steps in the ritual. He cleared the already-burnt dandelions from the dish and replaced them with new ones. 

He turned to reach for the matchbox, and when he did, his hand slid through a glowing blue light shaped all too convincingly like a man’s boot. 

“Steve?” 

He looked up. 

Steve looked down. 

Tony got to his feet, eagerly-- too eagerly, he told himself, much too eagerly for someone who was talking to a ghost. 

Steve waved, and then reached a hand out, palm flat, toward Tony. 

Tony frowned, watching him for a moment, before he realized it was an invitation. He suddenly felt cold, the hair on his forearms standing on end, and he reached up with his own hand, mirroring Steve’s gesture, until his palm was flat against Steve’s blue, glowing one. It felt incongruous, to see his hand touching Steve’s, but to feel no pressure, no warmth, no resistance from the other man’s hand. But if Tony tried hard enough, and held his hand carefully enough, so the two palms matched exactly and didn’t begin to overlap, he could imaging the feeling of Steve’s hand against his own-- bigger, maybe a little rougher, a little more callused, but still soft and reassuring. 

“I want you here,” Tony said, and then a moment later, he realized he’d said it out loud, and his breath faltered. 

But Steve only smiled sadly, and nodded, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. He mouthed something back, and Tony couldn’t quite make out what it was, but he imagined Steve was echoing his sentiment. 

“I’m trying,” Tony assured him. 

Tony didn’t speak again, didn’t frantically ask questions, didn’t try to interrogate Steve as to what he might be able to do to open the door Steve had drawn for him on his last visit. He just stood, silent, and looked into Steve’s eyes, hand raised alongside Steve’s hand, until Steve’s image flickered and faded. 

And it felt better, somehow, than it had before...there was less urgency, certainly, less of a feeling of failure. Tony only felt a little sad, at missing someone he didn’t even know. 

A ghost, he reminded himself. Someone he couldn’t ever really know. 

That night, very late at night, when Tony tiptoed up from his workshop, hoping Pepper wouldn’t catch him out again, Steve reappeared on the landing outside his room. 

“You’re here,” Tony observed, and he felt happy, but not particularly _surprised_. He gestured for the ghost to follow him, and slipped into his bedroom. 

Tony undid his suspenders, and then looked rather abashedly at Steve. “I, uh...I realize this might sound like a silly thing to ask _you_ , but, ah...would you mind turning around? For, uh, propriety’s sake?” 

Steve raised an eyebrow, looking supremely amused, as if it was a joke, and then shrugged and made an open-palmed gesture, as if to say, “whatever you want,” and obligingly turned around while Tony undressed for bed. Tony looked up from one moment to the next, worried Steve would vanish while he wasn’t looking, but, in spite of a few flickers, he persisted. 

“Finished,” Tony said, when he was done, and Steve turned back around. 

Tony hesitated for a moment, then climbed into bed, and patted the mattress beside him. “You can come here,” he offered. “I’m sorry I’m terrible company, but I really need to sleep. Just…” 

He patted the mattress again. Steve stepped forward, and frowned, and, after a moment’s consideration, tried to sit on the mattress. 

He ended up sitting on the floor. The effect was eerie, his glowing, bluish face and the tops of his shoulders visible above the mattress, as if he were a marble bust in bed with Tony, and Tony snickered at the sight. 

Steve gave him a placating look, and then shook his head, and stood up once more. 

“Sorry,” Tony repeated. 

Steve mouthed something, and Tony wasn’t sure what it was, but he didn’t seem to be angry. Instead, he leaned over the bed, and kissed Tony’s cheek. Tony couldn’t feel a thing, but it still left him warm and more at ease than he’d been in weeks. 

“You can stay,” Tony said, watching Steve with one eye open and the other one closed, the covers drawn up over his neck. “Is that all right?” 

Steve nodded. 

Tony smiled. 

When he woke up, Steve was gone.

Tony’s life fell into a pattern over the next days and weeks-- not the old one, but a pattern nonetheless. He’d tinker with the suit in the day, and then, when he was quite sure he could get out of the house without anyone’s notice, he’d make an escape, knowing that sometimes, in the next day or two, Pepper would find him with some newspaper clipping about a strange metal man who’d done some mysterious good deed or brought some villain to justice. In between, when no one was around, he’d do his best to research all forms of mysticism and the occult, deadly serious in a way that embarrassed him just a little, enough that he still hadn’t mentioned it to Pepper after that first interrogation. She’d teased him at first, asked him how “Steve” was doing, but when he hadn’t brought it up, after a while, she’d seemed to forget about it, chalked it up to one of his strange jokes.

And then, sometimes, when he was at his loneliest, or most tired, or even sometimes when he was neither of the two, Steve would appear. 

He was never there for more than a minute or two, and they didn’t talk much-- well, they tried, but the conversations were by nature one-sided, and usually cut short. Sometimes Tony would tell Steve what he’d tried that day to find a door, would show him the leftover odds and ends from another occult experiment, and Steve would smile wistfully and make approving gestures. 

“I’ll figure it out,” Tony assured him, one day. “It can’t be impossible.”

~

The sky was dark, and rain was pelting down in sheets that made the thought of going outdoors unpleasant at best. The raindrops pummeled the windowpane with a constant tap-tap-tap, and the streets outside glistened from the slick, wet cobblestones in wavering pools of light around the streetlamps.

Every time lightning struck, and the sky flashed blue for a brief moment, Tony was distracted by the illumination, thinking for a moment that Steve might have appeared, and glancing behind him, only to remember the storm outside. 

And then the doorbell rang, loudly and musically. Tony looked up wonderingly, and abandoned his work, moving toward the foyer. 

Jarvis was already there, and Pepper stood on the staircase, all looking ahead at the main entrance to the house. 

“Who could it be at this hour?” Tony asked.

“And in this weather?” Pepper added. 

Jarvis opened the door to a soaking, bedraggled figure wrapped up heavily in a dripping, dark cloak. Above a heavy scarf, only her eyes were visible, and it took Tony a moment to recognize her. 

“ _Tony_ ,” she said, and her voice was high and desperate, and she reached forward with freezing, wet hands to grip his shirt. 

“Wanda?” he said, wonderingly. “I’ve been looking--” 

She looked nervously over her shoulder, and pulled the scarf down from her mouth. “It worked?” she asked. “You can hear me?” 

“Of course I can--” Tony started, and then he gasped as realization struck. “ _Steve_ ,” he murmured. 

And then something jerked Wanda back, away from him, and she yelled. Pietro was at Wanda’s side, equally sopping from the rain, his white-blond hair plastered to his forehead. 

Tony blinked at the young man’s appearance-- he could have sworn that Wanda was alone a moment ago. 

“Wanda,” Pietro said, desperately, the rain splashing down on them both as he took her by the shoulders and shook her-- gently, but shook her nonetheless. “Wanda, don’t do this, _please_.” 

“I need to talk to Tony,” Wanda said. “It’s _urgent_ ; I don’t have another way.” She jutted out her chin. “Wanda would understand--” 

Pietro froze, trembling. “Whatever you are,” he hissed, clenching Wanda even more tightly. “ _give me back my sister_.” 

Wanda jerked away, toward Tony. “I’m trapped,” she said. “ _Please_ ,” she begged. “I need you to stop playing around and find a way to open a door and get me _out_ of here--” 

Tony gritted his teeth. “I’m trying,” he whispered. “But you’re terrifying the young man.” He took a deep breath. “Come in from the wet, and let him have his sister back.” 

Wanda grimaced, and gave Tony a sad look. “Hurry,” she said, but she nodded, and worried at her fingers. “I love you.” 

Tony shivered. “I love-” 

Wanda shuddered, and let out a loud cry, and fell backward into Pietro’s arms. 

“This needs to stop,” Pietro growled at Tony, embracing his sister tightly. “Whatever this is--”

Tony’s breath was ragged. He inhaled deeply, trying to regain composure. “I agree,” Tony said. He stepped back, making space in the foyer. “Bring her inside. Let’s get her warm, and figure out how to finish this. Jarvis?” he asked, turning to the butler. “Could you put on some tea?” 

Pietro carried Wanda into the house, and Tony sent Pepper to find dry clothes-- one of her own dresses, which was much too big on Wanda, and a combination of Jarvis’ and Tony’s clothing for Pietro. None of it fit him well-- he was too tall and too narrow, but between the two, they were able to cobble together a passable, and more importantly, dry, set of clothes. 

They installed Wanda on the sofa in the oft-unused parlor, wrapped up in as many spare blankets as they could find, while she drowsed, and Pietro paced restlessly by the fireside. Tony sat in an elegant, stiff-backed chair he had forgotten he owned, and sipped nervously at a cup of tea, Wanda’s last words echoing in his ears. 

I love you.

 _I love you_. 

Wanda stirred, and pulled herself up, taking in her surroundings with a frown. Her eyes stopped when she saw Tony. 

“Oh,” she said, a sinking expression on her face. 

Pietro was at her side in an instant, and Tony had to wonder if he’d imagined how quickly the young man had appeared there.  
“Are you all right?” Pietro asked Wanda, as he sat down beside her, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. “Do you need anything? Are you--” 

“I’m well enough,” Wanda assured him, snuggling up against him. “Are we--” She looked back to Tony. “I suppose I can guess what happened,” she said. 

Tony nodded. 

“I’m so sorry,” Wanda apologized. “I don’t know what’s happening. It’s all so--” She sunk down into the blankets, covering her face with her hands.

“It’s not your fault,” Tony assured her. “It’s quite obvious to me what’s happening. You’re being possessed.” 

Pietro snorted. “ _Possessed_?” he asked, incredulous. 

“You make a living pretending to talk to the dead, but the moment one of you _really_ does, it’s a joke?” Tony asked. “Listen, I saw him. I saw the ghost who--” 

“You didn’t see a _ghost_ ,” Pietro retorted. “That’s not how this _works_.” 

Wanda patted her brother’s knee. “Shh,” she said. “Let him explain. What did you see, Mr. Stark?” 

“I saw a man,” Tony answered. “Steve. It’s what you called yourself, the last time this happened. But he was...blue, and intangible...like a ghost. And he couldn’t speak. So I think he’s...possessing you so he can speak to me this sounds ridiculous…” He rubbed at his forehead. “I know. It’s not possible.” 

Tony took a deep breath. “But he’s _real_. And he wants my help.” 

“Your help?” Pietro asked, raising an eyebrow. “Why would he want _your_ help?” 

“I have no idea,” Tony admitted. “He seems to know me, but I’ve...I hadn’t met him before this. And you don’t seem to know him--”

Wanda shook her head. “It’s never happened before.”

Tony sighed. “I had hoped maybe you weren’t faking, that maybe you really did talk to ghosts.” 

“She wasn’t faking,” Pietro snapped. “But she doesn’t talk to ghosts.” 

“What I do is somewhat more--powerful,” Wanda added, quietly. 

Something flip-flopped in Tony’s chest. His heart skipped a beat, and he pressed his hands flat against his knees to keep his excitement from showing. “What do you mean? What’s more powerful than that?” 

He watched Wanda intently, and she bit her lip and gestured at Tony’s teacup, sitting on the table. She glanced at Pietro, questioning. 

PIetro sighed. “Very well,” he said, and he handed the teacup over to her. She put both hands around it, and dipped her face over the curls of steam. 

The teacup began to glow with a warm, golden light, and then rose into the air. 

“We have certain…” she began.

“Abilities,” Pietro said, from somewhere behind Tony. Tony twisted his neck to peer at Pietro, who was lounging, arms crossed over his chest, back against the dressing room door. 

“How did you vanish like that?” Tony asked, and Pietro vanished again. 

“Celerity,” Pietro said, this time back in the same place he’d occupied originally. “I don’t vanish. I’m just very fast.”

It made sense. All those times Pietro had seemed to appear without warning-- were just that. Tony nodded.

“And I can…” Wanda frowned as she gestured at the teacup, which now spun in place, the golden-brown tea bubbling up from the surface like blown glass. “Manipulate space, mostly. They’re not _tricks_ , but they make for a good show.” 

“We ran into problems in Europe,” Pietro explained, waving a hand in the air as if the entire story was barely worth telling. “It was a ticket out.” 

Tony watched the tea, mesmerized, as it spun in tendrils, delicate and sparkling in the firelight. “You fake magic so people don’t know you can do _real_ magic,” he said, fascinated. 

“Something like that,” Wanda admitted, as the teacup lowered itself to the table and the tea settled back in its place without even a splash. “But I can’t talk to the dead.” She looked solemnly at Pietro for a moment, and then back to Tony. “I’ve tried.” 

And Tony looked down at the teacup, and picked it up, looking at his own blurry reflection in the surface of the tea. “But that means,” he said, and his heart skipped a beat even as he tried to put the thought out of his mind, to keep himself from hoping for the impossible…  
“Whoever your Steve is,” said Pietro, “he’s not dead.” 

Tony gulped his tea. It was still too hot, and it burned his throat. He sputtered as he swallowed it. “But if he’s not dead,” he said. “What was he doing in my study?” 

The siblings glanced at each other with a sort of pained look. 

“Did he tell you what he wanted?” Wanda asked. “What kind of help he needed?” 

“He was trapped,” Tony replied. “He said he wanted me to open a door to bring him here.” 

Wanda looked amusedly at Tony for a moment, and then laughed. “Oh!” she exclaimed. “Is _that_ all?” 

Tony blinked. “All?”

~

Tony spent the day dizzy with anticipation. After a few abortive efforts to try to _call_ Steve, it became evident that that simply didn’t work, and Tony resigned himself to waiting until Steve showed up on his own.

But Steve never seemed to arrive when there were other people in the room, and Tony found himself aching with anxiety-- jumpy and certain that every move he made was wrong, would keep Steve from showing up again. 

“It would be just my luck,” he muttered to the falling rain outside the window, “if he didn’t bother on coming back for _days_.” 

But then, just after supper, where he’d been too nervous to have much of an appetite, he went to his study to get his best brandy, and when he turned around, with the decanter in one hand and a glass in the other, there was Steve, standing between the desk and the door. 

Tony nearly dropped the entire crystal decanter of brandy. 

“Tony,” Steve mouthed-- even if Tony couldn’t hear, he could recognize his own name. 

Tony couldn’t hide his delight. He stepped forward, putting the brandy down on the desk, smack on top of the stack of letters Pepper had been typing up earlier that day. 

“Steve.” Tony was so breathless that his words were barely audible. “I-- Wanda’s here,” he tried. “She says she can make a door.”  
Steve’s eyes brightened, and he straightened up a little, and nodded, as a broad smile spread across his face. He reached out a hand, toward Tony’s face.

“ _Yes_ ,” Tony answered, all too aware of the desperation in his tone. “ _Yes_. But I need you to just hold on a little longer while I get her.” 

He _sprinted_ through the house, wishing he had Pietro’s powers, finding Wanda back in the parlor where they had been sitting before. “I found him,” Tony said. “Er. Or he found me. He’s here.” 

Wanda looked up, eagerly. “Oh, thank goodness.” She said. “Maybe we’ll finally be through with this whole thing.” 

She stood up. “Where is he?” she asked, and then she turned toward Tony, and her eyes widened. “Oh,” she said. 

Tony frowned, and turned around the follow Wanda’s gaze. There was Steve, standing just behind him, still cool and ice-blue and winking like a dying candle. 

Tony stepped forward, regarding the man fondly. “Here’s Wanda,” he said, pointing to the young woman. “She thinks she can open a door for you.” 

Steve nodded, and held up a fist with a thumb pointing into the air, like a Roman at a gladiator match. 

“Is that a...good thing?” Tony asked, frowning. 

Steve rolled his eyes, and nodded again, shaking his head in what seemed to be a long-suffering sort of expression. 

“He can hear us?” Wanda asked. 

“He can hear,” Tony assured her. “We just can’t hear him.” 

Wanda stepped toward Steve. “Steve?” she ventured.

Steve’s expression brightened, and he waved, almost as if he were greeting an old friend. 

“Hello,” said Wanda. “I’m going to try to bring you here. Can you tell me where you are? Do you know where it is?” 

Steve shrugged, and shook his head, holding his hands up apologetically. 

Wanda took a deep breath, and shut her eyes, and held out her hands. “That makes it a little harder,” she told him. “I’m going to need your help. Can you see my hands?” 

Steve frowned, and nodded.

“I need you to focus on them,” Wanda said. “Reach out toward them, but not just with your hands--with your attention, as well.” 

Steve fixed his gaze on Wanda’s hands, and held his own hands out to mirror them, then tilted his head, questioningly, as if to ask if he was correctly following her instructions.

“Yes,” Wanda assured him. She shut her eyes even more tightly, and a bright light began to glow between them, searing and strange, like a tiny thread dangling in the air. It grew, brilliant and blinding, until it looked like a seam in the air, and Tony had to avert his eyes. 

“Do you see it?” Wanda asked. Her voice was strained, shrill, and her expression was twisted with effort, her cheeks flush. “Do you see the door?” 

The blazing light began to spread, like a string that had been knotted at both ends, and the air within it was dark and opalescent, like an oil slick glimmering with an unearthly spectrum. 

Steve took a deep breath, and nodded, hesitantly. 

“I need you to open it from your side,” Wanda said. “Open it the rest of the way.” 

Tony watched as Steve, trembling, still translucent and blue, reached for the black center of a gleaming circle. 

And then, solid, human fingertips pushed through borders of the shape, like they were peeking through a slowly unraveling hole in a glove, and there they were, pink flesh grasping out of a gaping hole. 

Steve gasped as if he’d been burned, and retracted his hand, clutching at it. 

“Again!” Wanda commanded. “Try again!” 

The glimmering blue figure of a man drew another breath, heavy and audible, and shut his eyes tightly, then _dove_ at the floating shape, shoulder first, as if he were forcing his way through a mobbing crowd. 

And then there was a strange young man in the room with them, solid and alive and _staggering_ forward on uneasy legs. He looked every bit like the glowing projection, but he was real and breathing raggedly, and swaying as if he were dizzy.

Tony shot forward and reached both arms out just as the young man-- Steve, this was _Steve_ , in the flesh-- fell into them, choking and gasping for air as if he’d been drowning. 

Tony stumbled backward onto the carpet, his shoulders hitting the floor with a thud, and he looked up into Steve’s startled blue eyes, mind flooded with the awareness of the pressure and volume and heat of the other man’s body. 

“Steve?” Tony asked, breathless. “You’re Steve. You’re-- you’re _here_.” 

Steve, panting, looked at Tony with a terrified expression, eyes wide. “Oh, hell,” he said. “You’re not my Tony.” 

Steve promptly fainted.

~

“Not ‘his’ Tony?” Pepper asked, watching Tony as he paced the floor of the spare bedroom where they’d managed to tuck Steve into bed. “What does that mean?”

The Maximoffs had taken their leave, once PIetro had been completely satisfied that his sister wasn’t going to start channeling the spirit of a strange man again. Wanda had been tired but relieved, and thanked Tony for his help, in spite of his insistence that he hadn’t done anything. 

“I don’t _know_ ,” Tony said, trying and failing to keep himself from glancing over at the sleeping man for the millionth time. He fidgeted with his fingers, worrying at his knuckles. “Why the hell would he think I’d be _his_ in the first place?” 

He couldn’t tell Pepper that he’d thought, however briefly, that he _was_.

“I couldn’t say,” Pepper answered, very patiently indeed. “Do you think maybe he was looking for someone else?” 

“Another Tony Stark?” Tony asked. 

“I know you like to believe that you’re incredibly singular,” Pepper answered. 

Tony huffed “Because I _am_!”

“Shhh,” Pepper hissed, and she pointed at the young man lying in the bed behind them. “You’ll wake him.” 

“Nothing has yet,” Tony replied. He stepped back over to the bed, ran his hand over the curious array of objects they’d taken from Steve’s belt and laid out carefully on the nightstand-- a knife, a small black box with a slick, shiny screen that lit up with a series of numbers when he pressed a smooth, flat button, what appeared to be a strange sort of pistol, coated in a smooth, black substance. He slid a finger over the round disk that they’d had to detach from a harness Steve wore across his shoulders, that now leaned against the side of the bed-- it looked like a Spartan shield, perfectly round and made of some lightweight, impossibly hard metal that entirely absorbed the sound when he tapped his knuckles against it. 

Pepper opened a small leather billfold, and pulled out a smooth, flat card made of some kind of flexible material, imprinted with a holographic seal. It had the young man’s photograph on it, and his name typed out in oddly boxy letters. 

“Steven G. Rogers,” she read out loud. 

“Rogers,” Tony repeated. “I’ve heard that name. Where have I heard--” 

“It’s not exactly uncommon,” Pepper said, but then she frowned, and held out the card to Tony, flipping it over to the back. “Tony, look.” 

There was an embossed silver seal, shaped like an eagle. 

Tony looked at the silver ring on his own finger. “I didn’t hear it,” he said. “I _read_ it.” He made a beeline for the stairs, taking them two at a time, to retrieve the photo that Fury had left in his pocket. 

There, right beside his parents and a much-younger Fury, stood the obliterated S. Rogers, name clear and legible beneath his feet. 

He frowned and looked back at the young man in the bed. 

Pepper peered over his shoulder. “That can’t be him,” she said. “That photo was taken when you were a little boy, and this…” she gestured at Steve. “...fellow can’t be any older than either of us.”

He tilted his head, and watched Steve, asleep in the bed, very carefully, trying to discern whether the blankets were moving at all, whether the man was breathing or not. “Maybe...maybe it was his father,” he ventured. “Or an uncle, or-- there must be _some_ connection, with the eagle and Fury’s Fraternal Order.” 

Tony looked back to the photo. “Or maybe he really is dead.” 

“If I am,” Steve said, “This is a damn funny sort of afterlife.”

Tony yelped and jumped back from the bed, where Steve was squeezing his eyes shut, sleeping, and pushing himself up to sit. 

“You’re awake,” Tony observed. 

“And somehow not dead in spite of your insistence,” Steve agreed cheerily. He rubbed at his face and looked curiously around the room, letting out a low whistle. “Though there’s _definitely_ been some kind of mix-up.” He grinned, suddenly. “Hello, Pepper.” 

“Hello...Steve?” Pepper replied, frowning. “You...know me?” she asked. 

“You’re Tony’s executive officer,” Steve answered. “At least, you are, where I’m from.”

“I’m Tony’s secretary,” Pepper said, tentatively. “What do you mean, where you’re from?” 

Steve took a deep breath. “As best as I can tell,” he said, scratching his head as he slung his legs over the side of the bed, “I was trapped in a pocket dimension, and instead of going back to my _own_ universe, I wound up here.” 

Tony tried to piece together what the other man was saying. “You were trapped in a what?” 

“For god’s sake, Tony,” Steve replied. “We have been in many, many, many ludicrous situations over the years, but this is the first time in my adult life that _I’ve _been the one who’s had to explain interdimensional multiversal mechanics to _you_.” __

__Tony blinked._ _

__And blinked again. “Can you, uh. Go slower?”_ _

__Steve looked at his palms for a moment, and inhaled deeply. “Is Wanda here?” he asked._ _

__“We had them driven home,” Tony replied. “She was wrung out, after...whatever it was you had her do.”_ _

__“Right,” Steve said, as he played absentmindedly with a gold ring on his finger, that winked in the light. “So. Where I’m from, Tony Stark is a genius inventor. He made billions of dollars developing weapons for the US military, but quit after he was kidnapped by military insurgents in Afghanistan.”_ _

__Pepper glanced at Tony, and the two of them gave each other a long look. Tony shrugged, and shook his head._ _

__“He’s a genius inventor, all right,” Pepper agreed. “But that’s millions, and he was kidnapped by ranch hands in Lincoln County, Arizona.”_ _

__Steve blinked. “Yes!” he exclaimed._ _

__“Yes?” Tony asked, confused._ _

__“ _Yes_.” Steve stood up, smiling, and raked a hand through his hair. “You see?” He gestured with one hand, as if he expected Tony to be able to fill in the pieces of what he was saying. “There’s two of you. In two different worlds. Different _timelines_. Different circumstances. You’re _like_ my Tony, but here, you’re…” _ _

__Steve squinted at the wallpaper, and then at Pepper’s long, voluminous skirts, and then at the gaslight. “...Steampunk?” he tried._ _

__“Steam _what_?” Pepper asked, baffled. _ _

__“We have a tea kettle, if you…” Tony began, but he trailed off, watching Steve-- a real, living, breathing, _talking_ Steve-- wistfully. It had all been a mistake. Steve hadn’t been looking for _him_ ; he’d been looking for someone _like_ him, and even if Steve was right, even if that someone was his exact copy in every way, of course Steve would want to go back to _that_ someone. Not him. _ _

__He barely noticed that Steve was watching _him_ in return, regarding him with a soft, affectionate expression, until the other man came up to him and put a hand on his shoulder. “Thank you for your help,” Steve said. _ _

__“Anytime, pal,” Tony replied, straightening up too much, till his shoulders felt rigid beneath Steve’s hand, and Steve plucked the hand away, frowning. “Let me know what you need to get back to your T-- your-- place? Your, uh. World?”_ _

__“Wanda might be able to help,” Steve said. “But I don’t want to trouble her again so soon.” He flashed Tony a sort of tight, resigned-looking smile. “I’ve waited this long to get home; I can wait another day or so.”_ _

____

~

Tony walked stiffly into the dining room, wincing when he saw Steve, already seated and working his way through a pile of breakfast that could have fed an army.

“I, er. See you like toast,” Tony observed, as he sat down at his own place. “Or do you not have bread in your world?” 

Steve made crunching sounds as he chewed and then swallowed a mouthful. “High metabolism,” he explained, then flashed Tony a grin that made something in Tony’s chest twist painfully. “Good morning!” 

“Morning,” Tony said, more dismally than he meant to. 

Pepper followed him in, holding a newspaper, and Tony tensed for what he knew was about to come. 

“Did you see the paper today?” she asked, as she swept into her seat. She held it up, so Tony could see the rather inaccurately-rendered illustration on the front page. “Apparently this mysterious metal man has struck again.” 

Steve blinked, pausing mid-bite in his systematic toast-destruction.

“Is that so?” Tony asked. “How curious. That’s certainly an interesting-looking metal man, wouldn’t you say?”

“Fascinating,” Pepper answered. “Who do you suppose designed it? It’s quite the contraption. It says here that the metal man singlehandedly raided the office of a railroad manager who was involved in some kind of illegal weapons-trading.” 

“Well, that sounds like a highly admirable line of work,” Tony said, cheerfully. “I’d sure like to shake the hand of that fellow, whoever he is.” 

“It sounds dangerous, if you ask me,” Pepper said. “What do you think, Steve?” 

Steve looked something like a deer in headlights, eyes wide, and terrified. “Ah. That is... quite a story,” he answered, finally, struggling with the words. “If you’ll, uh...excuse me--” He shoved an entire piece of toast into his mouth in one very impressive bite, and got up from the table just as the doorbell rang-- and rang, and rang again, as if someone were leaning on it, hard, and not letting up.

Tony shot Pepper a dirty look and popped up from his chair to get the door. He opened it to a small child with soot-stained cheeks, who was puffing mightily and quite red from running. 

“Mr. Stark?” the child asked, voice ragged and hat in hands. 

“That’s me,” Tony said, leaning down toward the child. “What can I do for you?” 

“I came as fast as I could, sir...they sent me from the Fair. There’s been a terrible accident--”

Tony froze. “What sort?” he asked.  
“An explosion, Sir,” the boy said. “The fire department is on their way--”

“Right,” Steve said, and Tony started when he realized that the other man was standing just behind him. “Let’s go, Shellhead.” 

“I beg your pardon?” Tony asked, blinking at Steve. 

“Let’s go,” Steve repeated. “I’ll get my shield.” 

Tony shook his head. “I mean, what did you call me?” 

“Shellhead,” Steve replied. He pointed to his own skull. “Shell,” he said, and then knocked on it, like he was knocking on something hard. “Head. Come on.” 

Tony, flustered, paid the child a coin, and a few licorice drops, and turned back inside, staring uncomprehendingly at Steve as he shut the door. “What--”

“Suit up, _Iron Man_ ,” Steve said, sounding entirely earnest. “I can help, but I’ll need you to fly me there.” He turned on his heel and started for the stairs. 

Tony stood still, staring blankly. “How do you-- do I just _look_ like the sort of fellow who flies around in a metal suit--” 

Steve sighed, and stopped mid-step, turning back around to face Tony. He held up his left hand, and pointed to the ring on his finger, the gold one that winked in the light. “Tony Stark doesn’t _keep_ things from me,” he said, softly. “He’s my _husband_. Go get your suit.” 

Tony’s stomach flipped, and he felt frozen in place for a moment, watching Steve ascend the stairs with a sense of wonder and cold, sheer terror. A heavy lump formed in his throat. _Husband_ , Steve had said. It was easier to believe that there might be a world where men married other men than it was to believe the information that this man, whoever he was, was married to his own counterpart. Somewhere. 

Tony tried to shake it off as he ran for his workshop. 

They met on the roof of Tony’s house, Steve wearing the costume he’d word when he’d come into Tony’s world, the heavy blue suit with the star on the chest, with a mask Tony hadn’t seen before pulled over his face, little white wings above either ear. He had the shield harnessed to his back, and he smiled, eyes beaming, at the site of the suit.

“That newspaper illustration was a piece of shit,” he told Tony. “It’s beautiful.” 

Tony was grateful in that moment for the helmet, that kept Steve from seeing him blush. “Thanks, Steve,” he said. “What are the wings for?” 

“Flying.” Steve put his arms around Tony’s waist, and pulled himself in close against the suit. Tony’s throat went tight and dry. 

“Ah...I’m not sure how to do this,” Tony admitted. “I’ve never, er...taken someone else up with me. It might not work.” 

“Trust me,” Steve answered, sounding thoroughly confident. “It’ll work.” 

And work, it did. Tony soared overhead, Steve clasping on firmly and comfortably, as if this were a thing he did every day.

It probably _was_ a thing he did every day, Tony reminded himself, with a pang of envy. 

The flames could be seen from blocks away, from this vantage point, and it appeared that an entire pavilion had caught ablaze. Tony swore, and sped faster toward the fire, hurtling downward at a tremendous speed. He wrapped one arm around Steve before he realized what he was doing, holding the other man tightly in place as he dropped to the ground. 

The sight from the ground was no better. Just as the messenger child had said, the firefighters were there, spraying at the blaze with what seemed like increasing futility. 

Steve leapt into action, as if this were the most natural thing in the world. 

“Sir,” he said to the nearest fireman. “What happened here?” 

“Well now,” said the firefighter, squinting at Steve’s costume. “We got word a man exploded.”

“Exploded?” Steve asked. 

Tony swore under his breath. Of _course_. 

“Just like that,” the firefighter said, with a shrug. “Listen, Buddy, but it’s getting real hot. You may want to stay out of the--”

“Captain Steve Rogers, US Army,” Steve said, with a polite nod. “And this is my friend Iron Man. We’re here to help.” 

“Is that so?” asked the firefighter, who observed them both cautiously. “Hey!” he exclaimed, when he saw Tony. “Hey, you’re that metal man from the papers who saved all those people,” he said, excitedly. “Listen, there’s a man caught in there--you think you can help?” 

Tony nodded. He looked at the towering wall of flame, gulped, and then looked back to the firefighter. “Give me the hose,” he said, holding out a hand. “I can extinguish this from above; Steve, if I get you a clear entry, can you--”

“On it,” Steve assured him, unbuckling the shield. He stepped toward the fire, holding the shield up as a barrier between himself and the flames. 

Tony hefted the heavy firehose over a shoulder and tugged it upward, into the air. 

From above, he was able to direct the water toward the heaviest part of the blaze, trying to scan the area for the man who was trapped. When he saw him, waving his arms frantically from below, he signalled to Steve, who raced into the inferno. 

Tony tried to direct the water toward the man imprisoned by the fire, keeping the flames at bay until Steve was able to reach him, and lifted the man up with one arm, carrying him to safety. 

Between Tony’s efforts from above and the firefighters on the ground, the blaze was confined, and then, finally, dwindled, leaving behind a charred and smoldering shell of the theater Tony had sat in only weeks ago. 

He made his way back to the ground, panting with effort, and hurried to find Steve and the man they’d rescued. 

Tony recognized him at once, and nearly spoke, before he remembered that he wasn’t technically Tony Stark at the moment. 

“Iron Man,” Steve said, gesturing between Tony and the man by way of introduction. “This is Dr. Horton; he says his experiment was stolen.” 

Dr. Horton was covered head to toe in black soot, his face ruddy and sweat-stained from the heat, and he was breathing raggedly. 

“The Human Torch?” Tony asked, in spite of himself. 

“ _Oh_ ,” Steve said, wonderingly, and Tony couldn’t tell if Steve’s tone was one of _recognition_.

Dr. Horton’s eyebrows raised in surprise. “You know my work?” he asked. 

“Of course,” Tony replied. “Doesn’t everyone?”

Steve coughed into one hand and gave Tony a sidelong look. “Doctor, if you’d be so kind, do you have any idea who would have done such a thing, or why, or where they might have taken your, er...work?” 

Dr. Horton gasped for breath, then nodded. “I met the fellow....a few weeks ago, right here. He was...very inquisitive, very inquisitive about my research. Came back to see the show a few times, in fact, always with new questions. Asked me how much my masterpiece would cost; I told him it wasn’t for sale, but…” Dr. Horton shook his head. “His name slips my mind, very loud man, very loud suits, started with an H, maybe, maybe Harper, or--”

“Hammer,” Tony supplied. 

“Yes!” Dr. Horton exclaimed. “Mr. Hammer! After I refused to sell, he got very angry, and, well, you see what he’s done now…” Shaking his head, he gestured out at the wreckage of the pavilion. 

“We do indeed,” said Steve. “You know this Hammer fellow, Iron Man?” he asked. 

“I do,” Tony replied. “Unfortunately.” 

Steve stood up straight, and put a hand on Dr. Horton’s shoulder, a kindly, confident expression on his face. “Don’t worry, Doctor,” he said, reassuringly. “We’ll get your work back. I promise.” 

Tony had to admit he was impressed with Steve’s poise and composure. He wondered if Steve did this sort of thing often, with his Tony, back...wherever Steve was from, and he let his mind wander into a daydream of what that might be like, to do this work _together_ , with someone who didn’t hesitate to throw himself headlong into danger for a good deed.

“--Going?” Steve asked, and he nudged Tony, frowning. Tony was startled back to reality as he realized that Steve had been speaking to him, and he shook himself, then nodded. 

“Ah, yes. Of course, Captain Winghead,” he answered cheerfully, and he stepped into position to let Steve hold onto him again for takeoff.

But Steve, one hand out, hesitated, frowning at Tony. 

“What?” said Tony.

“Nothing,” Steve answered quietly, as he put his arms around the Iron Man suit. “That’s just... what _my_ Tony calls me.” 

Tony felt a pang in his chest as he lifted off. “You miss him, don’t you?” he asked softly.

“Yeah,” Steve said. “I’m sorry....for the confusion, for…I really thought you were him.” 

“Look, it’s fine by me,” Tony said, even though it wasn’t. “I just...I can’t say I don’t envy you both.” 

“You haven’t come across my counterpart here?” Steve asked. “That’s funny; I’ve...well, we’ve seen a lot of universes, and that’s one thing that’s always a constant. Captain America and Iron Man.” 

Tony was glad for the helmet, again, because he found himself grimacing like he’d just swallowed something bitter. “It’s not that I haven’t come across him,” Tony admitted. “It’s just that, well...I don’t know what happened to him, but I’ve only seen him in old photos of my parents. He’s got to be old enough to be my father by now, and--” 

Steve was silent for a long time, and then he started to laugh, and Tony couldn’t for the life of him determine what could be so funny.. “Oh,” he said, finally. “ _Oh_.”

Tony winced-- the laughter stung. “Sorry, pal,” Tony said. “But I’m not seeing the humor in that.” 

He touched down on the roof of his house again, and quickly made his way inside. He needed to get away from Steve...just for a minute, he told himself, he needed to be able to breathe and regain his composure. 

He made his way down to his workshop, and began removing the suit, but he’d only just taken off the last piece of armor when he heard footsteps on the staircase.

It was Steve. Tony cringed inwardly, but put on a smile that he hoped didn’t look too forced. 

It didn’t seem to work. Steve stood there, looking cautious, just at the bottom of the stairs. “Tony,” he said. “Good work out there.” 

Tony shrugged. “Same to you, partner,” he said. “It was nice...not working alone, for once.” 

He could hear the tension in his own voice, and he winced inwardly. 

“Tony,” Steve repeated. “I wanted to tell you...you...don’t give up just yet.” 

“Give up?” Tony asked. “Give up on what?” 

Steve took a deep breath. “In my world,” he started, and then looked down at his feet. “You’re going to think this is insane.” 

“I watched you walk into my parlor from a pocket dimension, whatever that is,” Tony replied. “Try me.” 

Steve smiled softly at that. “In my world, I died. Well. Everyone thought I was dead. I fell into the ocean and was frozen in ice for decades.” 

“ _Decades_?” Tony asked, incredulous. “How did you survive?”

“ _Long_ story,” Steve said, with a snort. “But Tony...my Tony found me. He and his team found me, and gave me a home, when I didn’t have one.” 

“I have a team?” Tony asked, recalling how seamlessly he and Steve had worked together. “I mean...your Tony. Your Tony has a team?” 

Steve smiled, and nodded. “And they found me. Near the North Pole.” He gave Tony a pointed look. 

Tony frowned, and regarded Steve for a long moment. He looked down at the ring he was still wearing, his mother’s ring. “I guess I’d better find a team.”

~

Tony tried to look presentable before starting up the stairs, smoothing his hair back and straightening his collar. He’d sweated half-through his shirt, and there wasn’t much he could do about that apart from reminding himself to keep clean shirts in the workshop.

Steve followed him up, and Tony, for the first time, realized that he wasn’t feeling a pang of regret at the man’s presence any longer. “We should find out where Hammer took the Human Torch,” Tony said. “And get it back before something _really_ terrible happens.” 

“We should call the twins,” Steve agreed. 

“Twins?” Tony asked. 

“Wanda and Pietro,” Steve replied. 

Tony stopped mid-step and looked back at Steve in disbelief. “They’re _twins_? I wasn’t even sure they were really siblings...” 

He trailed off at the top of the stairs, hearing voices in the hall. 

“Of course,” Pepper said. “I’ll let him know you were here.”

“Who--” Tony asked, and he immediately regretted it as he stepped into the hall. There stood Nick Fury-- puffing away on his cigar, talking to Pepper. Tony shot a warning look to Steve, who immediately stepped back, out of view. 

Fury blinked at Tony’s voice, and glanced toward him. “Back already?” he asked. 

“From the store,” Pepper supplied cheerfully, giving Tony a pointed look. “Did you get the--” 

“A dozen,” Tony replied, pleased with himself for not missing a beat. “I got a dozen, just like you said.” 

“A dozen coats?” Fury asked, his one visible eyebrow quirking up. “You must get very cold.” 

“Oh, I do,” Tony replied cheerfully. ‘Very chilly, these New York winters.” He wrapped his arms around himself. “Brrr. I hear we’re in for a frosty one.”

“I wasn’t expecting to see you here,” Fury admitted. “Our mutual friend the metal man has been up to some interesting things this afternoon.” 

Tony raised both eyebrows. “Is that so?” he asked. “He wasn’t also shopping for coats, was he? I imagine it’s difficult to fit a coat over a metal suit.” 

“This afternoon, he rescued--” 

Tony took a breath, steeled himself as he considered how he was going to explain this one. 

“--three police officers from the Hammer Industries headquarters after an incident--”

“--He _did_?” Tony interrupted. 

Both Pepper and Nick Fury stared, silently, at Tony for a moment.

“He...didn’t?” asked Fury.

“I wouldn’t know,” Tony replied. “You’d have to ask him about it, but…” His thoughts were spinning at an unstoppable pace. Had Hammer stolen his designs, too? Was there another metal man? Could it be an imposter, or miscommunication? Did the workers lie? Was Hammer trying to draw him out? “...I certainly hadn’t heard anything like that.” 

“I was there,” Fury said, slowly. “I saw him.” 

Tony exchanged glances with an equally-perplexed Pepper. “You...did?” Tony asked. “What...what did he look like? I’d love to know. Ah. Considering I’ve only seen the illustrations in the papers, like everyone else.” 

“Average build,” Fury said, regarding Tony with some suspicion. “I’d say, about your height and your weight, red as bright as a cardinal…”

“Red?” Tony asked, frowning. “ _Red_?” 

“Red?” Pepper echoed, looking alarmed.

There was another suit. Another Iron Man. Another-- 

“Yes,” said Fury. “Bright red. Called me ‘Director,’ with an inflection that sounded _curiously_ like yours, answered to ‘Stark’ almost like it might have been his name--”

It hit Tony like a brick to the chest. “ _Stark_?” Tony asked. “He called himself Stark?” 

“Frightening coincidence, isn’t it?” Fury asked, playfully. 

“It’s not a coincidence,” Tony responded excitedly. “I know who it is. Steve!” 

Steve pushed the door open and stepped into view, and Fury’s cigar fell out of his mouth, ash crushing as it hit the floor. 

“Watch the carpet!” Pepper snapped, and she reached down to pick it up. 

But Fury didn’t answer her. He just stared at Steve, while Steve stood in the doorway. 

“Director?” Steve said, nodding his head. “Fancy meeting you here.” 

“You’re…” Fury moved his mouth, but no sound came out. “You died. You--” 

“You probably should look into that,” Steve said cheerfully. “But no. I’m not _that_ Steve.” 

“And I’m not that Stark,” Tony explained, pleased that he could watch Fury looking as confounded as he was sure he had looked only moments before. He laughed, and looked to Steve. “I think your ride home just--” 

The entire house began to rumble, and now all _four_ of them looked confounded, but the vibrations settled, and there was a loud crack, and the front door swung open, without even so much as a knock. 

The lock had been broken clear in two, and looked charred around the sharp ridges of broken metal. 

“Steve?” said a voice that, though oddly, distinctly fuzzy, sound curiously like Tony’s own. “Steve?” 

And there, just as Fury had described, stood a man in a metal suit. This one was like something beyond Tony’s imagination, all slick sheen and impossibly smooth, detailed curves, like something that had been sculpted by a Great Master. It was painted shimmering red and brilliant gold, and Tony felt awe rising in his gut.

And then the man’s eyes-- blue as Tony’s own behind the mask-- met Tony’s.

The man said, “well, shit.” 

But then Steve leapt for him, and embraced him tightly, and the Other Iron Man’s helmet seemed to retract-- _retract_ , Tony thought, in amazement-- into the suit with a slight hissing sound, and the man inside looked so much like Tony that, apart from a few slight details-- the man’s shorter, but somehow scruffier hair, his more finely-trimmed beard, the small gold earring in one ear-- Tony might have been looking into a mirror. 

This new Tony-- this Tony-doppelganger, this whatever-he-was-- pressed his forehead _hard_ against Steve’s, and shook with laughter. 

“I found you,” he said, softly, and Tony wondered if he were looking in on too intimate a moment-- made strangely _more_ intimate by the fact that one of the men was his double. “I found you. Richards has been scanning worlds for _days_ , and--” 

“I got stuck in a pocket dimension,” Steve explained. “I would’ve been off the map. But _this_ world’s Tony found me, and--” 

Tony wasn’t sure whether he was supposed to feel elated or dismal, and his emotions kept tumbling between the two.

“Some explanation--” Fury began. 

“Oh, it’s just interdimensional multiversal mechanics,” Tony answered, with a handwave, as if it were the simplest thing in the world. 

Steve snorted, as he stepped away from this _other_ Tony, and shot Tony a look over his shoulder. “We came from another universe,” he explained, matter-of-factly. 

“Oh,” said Fury. “Well. I thought it was going to be something complicated.” 

Pepper coughed. 

The _new_ Tony looked past Steve, and grinned it her. “Hey, Pep!” he said, cheerily. “You’re looking well. I love what you’ve done with your hair. And you--” 

The new Tony smiled at Tony like he was seeing an old friend for the first time in a long time, a sparkle in his eye, and he reached out both shiny metal arms. “C’mere, you.” 

Apparently this version of himself gave _very_ good hugs. 

“Thanks for taking care of my Steve,” New Tony whispered into Tony’s ear. “I owe you one.” 

Tony shrugged. “Anytime, Pal,” he said, and meant it. “You want to get out of that hunk of junk?” 

After Tony found a clean set of clothing for the New Tony, he ordered Fury out of his house, and left New Tony and Steve to be alone. The more he watched them, the more excruciatingly hard it became, and as happy as he was for Steve, seeing the way they held each other, looked at each other, laughed at joked they didn’t even need to say aloud, all Tony could wish was that he could have that, too, and...it was still too big a wish, no matter what Steve said. 

Tony went to find Wanda, now that he knew the address of the hotel where she and Pietro were staying, and asked the twins-- _twins_ , he marveled-- to come help see Steve off. 

“I can give you multiversal coordinates,” New Tony told her, scribbling something down on a sheet of paper. He’d changed back into his Iron Man suit, and Tony regretted that he’d only gotten a few minutes to look at it. “They’ll help you open a gate.” 

Wanda frowned at the numbers, looking dubious. 

“Don’t worry,” Steve assured her. “We’ve got friends on our side helping, too. We just need you to make the first contact.” 

“Like a telegraph,” Wanda mused, nodding. 

“Something like,” agreed New Tony, and he went to check on Steve, tangling their fingers together and whispering softly. 

Tony was watching the entire scene with a dry throat and an uneasy sort of jittery feeling. If it worked, Steve would be gone. If it didn’t, well...he was stuck watching _himself_ very much in love in a way that he’d never felt himself. 

He watched Steve thoughtfully. He’d have to get a ship, and, well, a crew, and the North Pole was _cold_. He briefly regretted that he hadn’t _actually_ bought a dozen coats...and no one had ever really _gotten_ to the Pole, had they? He’d heard about what had happened to the Polaris expedition, and DeLong…

Then again, he reminded himself, they weren’t Tony Stark. 

But still, the likelihood of finding a single man in the middle of a vast, frozen ocean…

“Hey,” said the New Tony, as he clapped Tony’s shoulder and startled him out of his thoughts. “We’re about ready to go, and I’ve got something I thought you might like to have.” 

Tony found himself back in his parlor, where Wanda, face full of determination and focus, had somehow opened another door like the one they’d brought Steve through-- but instead of black, the center of this one was bright and brilliant and warm.

Tony raised an eyebrow. “Well, you don’t _have_ to leave me the suit, but if you insist--” 

New Tony chuckled. “I can’t risk completely destroying your timeline, pal,” he said. “But Steve told me you might be going somewhere sometime soon, and I thought you could use this.” 

He held out a small, black disk, no larger than Tony’s-- well, either Tony’s-- palm. Tony turned it over in his hand. It was a comfortable weight, smooth, and had small holes in one side.

“What is it?” Tony asked. 

“Vibranium tracker,” said New Tony. “You decide you want to find this world’s Steve, this’ll key in on his shield. Nothing else like it.” 

Tony swallowed, and slid it into his pocket, and gave New Tony a grateful nod. “If this world’s Steve has a shield.” 

“Are you kidding me?” New Tony asked, with a laugh. “Steve _always_ has a shield.” 

Steve stepped over Tony and put a hand on his arm. “Thanks,” he said. “Thanks for listening to me. Thanks for finding me.”

Tony swallowed. “Thanks for letting me be part of your team,” he said. He glanced over at Wanda. “Time to find a new one, I suppose.” 

And Steve gave Tony a tight hug, and stepped toward New Tony, and the two of them clasped hands, and walked through the door. 

The door flickered and snapped from view.

Tony felt a lump in his throat, heavy like a stone, and he collapsed on the sofa next to Wanda, who was catching her breath, eyes shut, hands over her temples. 

“I _definitely_ owe you dinner,” Tony informed her.

~

In the morning, Tony arrived at a somber, grey building on a somber, grey street, with tall imposing double doors and an eagle insignia carved into the facade. He stepped inside, spoke to the desk attendant, and walked up three flights of stairs.

A woman dressed like a secretary, with a ruffled white blouse and a neat wool skirt, hair pinned up in a twist, stepped out of an office, and raised an eyebrow at him. “Mister Stark,” she said, smoothing her soft, red hair. “Nice to see you’ve decided to drop by.” 

Tony frowned for a moment before he placed her. “You’re the widow,” he said. “From the fair.” 

She smirked and started down the hallway. “I’m a lot of things,” she said. “I’ll be seeing you around.” 

Tony spoke to a secretary, and waited in an uncomfortable wooden chair until the door opened again. 

“Stark,” said Fury. “Come in.” 

“I don’t need to come in,” Tony said. “I just stopped by to say it’s a deal.” 

“What’s a deal?” Fury asked. 

Tony took a deep breath. “I’ll be on your team,” he said. “In fact. I think I can find you a few new recruits, too. On one condition.” 

“Oh?” Fury raised his eyebrow and took a big puff on his cigar. “What’s that?”

“I want every piece of information you have pertaining to Steve Rogers.” 

He waited, watching for Fury’s reaction, but there was none, only another puff of the cigar.

Tony cleared his throat. “And, uh. And a boat.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading this fic! If you enjoyed it and would like to share it with your friends, you can reblog the [Tumblr post located here](http://teaberryblue.tumblr.com/post/169469025594/ghosts-of-the-gilded-age-story-by-teaberryblue).
> 
> The 1883 World's Fair in *our* timeline was scheduled to take place in Inwood, in New York City, but was cancelled due to poor planning and overspending. [You can read about it here.](http://myinwood.net/the-worlds-fair-that-never-was/)
> 
> Also: I think I missed a couple of typos in this fic, and I tried to find them again, so if anyone sees any typos, please feel free to correct, with my thanks.


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